


After The Fall

by red_to_black



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Slash, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-17
Updated: 2017-10-02
Packaged: 2018-05-02 02:38:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 31
Words: 374,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5230694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/red_to_black/pseuds/red_to_black
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>All Brett wants is to make it to the rumoured safe zone and meet up with his friends. What he ends up with is a snarky, cranky seventeen year old who he's not quite sure won't kill him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. One - No Such Thing As A Friendly Face

**Author's Note:**

> Of course it's a zombie AU! Why not? Right? Three cheers for snarky Liam!  
> Thanks for reading guys! Side note - this probably won't be updated as often as Threads. Just cause.

**Chapter One - No Such Thing As A Friendly Face**

"Find the city," Brett grumbles. "Get _through_ the city. But no one said _how_." 

He's having a crappy day, to say the least. He's out of food and drinking water and it seems like the city he's in has been picked over pretty well. It's cold - winter is approaching - and, yeah. His situation pretty much couldn't get worse. 

He thinks he's heading in the right direction, but it's not like he'd know, really, because he doesn't have a map. All he has to go on is Tom's vague directions, which, two months after being given them in the middle of a firefight, he can't exactly remember very well.

For example: does he take a left or a right onto Station Street? Fucked if he knows. "Follow the tram line," Tom said, but the tram line runs _both ways_. Brett would love to believe that this is one of those times where specifics don't matter, but frankly, he's not that lucky. 

What's freaking him out the most? The distinct LACK of zombies. He figured a city this size would be overrun with the bastards, but even though there are zombie corpses everywhere, he's yet to see one of them shambling towards him.

He hopes whatever company is here turns out friendly, on the off chance he runs across them. Then again, he hasn't met friendly people in a while, so getting his hopes up might be stupid.

He looks down the tram track. Sighs. Spins in a circle to look back the way he came. He's got no clue. At least there aren't any zombies. For now.

He heads left on the tram track. When he does, he looks up, notices that the sun is beginning to go down, and feels nervous. He's got no food and water, nothing to make a fire with, and he can't even begin to remember how he ended up in this situation being as hungry and worn out as he is. 

He has to find somewhere to bunk down for the night. It's looking like that won't be so easy.

He sees a 7-11 on the corner of the next block he passes and hesitates. He knows he shouldn't look, not without a weapon, but he'll starve to death if he doesn't find something pretty soon. He's already feeling shaky and sick. 

The window is smashed. He climbs in, takes a look around cautiously. Nothing in terms of zombies - plenty of corpses - but a few cans and jars are intact. 

He's heading straight for a shelf when he hears it - the shuffle, the groaning, hissing, guttural noises of a zombie, pretty fucking close to him. 

He legs it. He doesn't have a weapon so the only option, really, is to get the fuck out; he's seen plenty of people die because they thought they could fight the zombies hand-to-hand, apparently forgetting that the fucking things are thirsty for flesh and blood and also impossible to kill unless you cause trauma to their brains.

He makes it out onto the street, and fuck - they're everywhere, and for some reason, they're all young and wearing bikinis and that's a whole new level of body horror, seeing what would normally be some really hot chicks in bikinis coming at him with their jaws gnashing hungrily and their flesh falling from their bodies. That's fucked up.

He's reaching for a piece of pipe on the road when one of the zombies drops dead right in front of him, an arrow piercing its skull. The three around it go down as well. Brett's shaking like a leaf, barely clinging to the length of pipe, as the zombies drop all around him, like dominoes.

The whole thing takes less than two minutes. It's silent. 

He turns around to see where the arrows came from - and sees a bat swinging towards him, feels it impact his skull, and he's out before he hits the ground.

~*~

He comes to with his head throbbing viciously.

He gives it a moment, then opens his eyes hazily. The world swims for a few seconds before adjusting; he's lying on the pavement, on his side, in what he soon realises is the recovery position. Even as he sits up, he realises he's not in the same area that he was in.

Dread floods him. Not only is the knock on the head and his changed location probably a rather large red flag that he's in danger, he also doesn't know how to orient himself from here. 

He starts to stand up, hears a slight clicking noise to his right, and a voice saying lowly, "Easy."

He turns around, slowly, and there's a kid standing behind him. Kid? Guy? He's not really all that sure. It's hard to tell in this light. Either way, the person is aiming a crossbow at him, steady as a rock, and watching him warily.

"Hi," he says weakly.

The kid circles around so he's standing in front of him, kneels down. He puts a bottle of water on the ground and rolls it towards Brett with his foot.

"What's this?" Brett asks reluctantly.

"What's it look like?" the kid says. He sounds kind of growly, voice low-pitched, which Brett supposes is meant to be intimidating. If he's honest, it's working pretty well. Although that could be the crossbow. 

"Thanks," he says, and drinks. The kid watches him, still as a statue, his eyes narrowed and suspicious. "You hit me pretty hard."

"Not as hard as I could have." 

Brett blinks. The kid's right; his head isn't throbbing as badly as it has after some lacrosse injuries, and he's now realising that he was in the recovery position when he woke up - because the kid put him there, in that position, and obviously hung around. 

"Crossbow," he says dumbly.

The kid arches an eyebrow. "Good job," he says. "Glad we've got that sorted."

"You killed those zombies, didn't you?" Brett asks. "Why?"

"Because they were gonna eat you?"

"Did you have to knock me out?" Brett groans. 

The kid shrugs, doesn't give him a proper answer, so Brett tries again. "You've been following me all day, haven't you?" he asks. "Stalking is illegal, you know."

"It's the zombie apocalypse," the kid says. "Nothing is illegal anymore." 

He's got a good point. Law fell to the wayside right after the marshal version of it was enacted and people lost their shit. "So why the love tap?" he asks, pointing at the abandoned baseball bat. "Seems kind of extreme."

The kid edges a little closer to him. "Had to make sure you weren't packing," he says. 

Brett rubs the back of his head. "I'm not," he says. 

"Uh huh," the kid snorts derisively. "That's what they all say. Where're the rest of your group? You can't have come here alone." 

"I did." 

The kid narrows his eyes. Brett can't pin his age - he's broad and muscular, but he's also barely 5'5", and while there's a hint of scruff on his cheeks and jaw, his face is young. His eyes are bright, intelligent, alert - a piercing sky blue in colour. 

"What're you doing here?" the kid asks bluntly.

"Passing through," Brett says uneasily. "Just trying to get somewhere."

"Where?" Okay, so the kid clearly doesn't trust him. Brett can't exactly say he's surprised. Or that he even blames him, really. There are no good people left.

"It's a place called Oakridge," Brett says slowly. "Have you heard of it?"

The kid doesn't answer him for a moment, then finally shakes his head warily. 

"Supposedly it's a camp for survivors," Brett says. "They take people in. I'm looking for a few buddies of mine and I think they might've gone that way."

He's surprised to see that the kid is looking less and less wary of him and more and more interested in what he's saying - but he hasn't lowered the fucking crossbow even an inch - and where the fuck did a teenager get a _crossbow_ , seriously - and that he's taken a few tiny steps closer.

"How long have you been on your own?" Brett asks.

"None of your business," the kid fires back. "How'd you get separated from your friends?"

"A herd," Brett says. "I was with a few other people, but they..."

The kid cocks his head sideways. "Did they turn?"

"I guess you could say that," Brett says. "Although they turned on each other and me before they got bitten and killed. I was the only one who made it out I think. I've been on my own since then, just trying to find my way to Oakridge. This seemed like the most direct path through." 

The kid stares at him - and stares, and stares, and Brett's getting uncomfortable. Finally, he says, "This was the fastest way through. The military collapsed most of the tunnels out of the city. You can get in, but you can't get out - unless you go back the way you came and circle around." 

"That would take weeks," Brett argues. "Winter will be here by then."

The kid shrugs. "I didn't say it would be easy," he says. 

Brett rubs his face. He's starving and cold already; going back when he's this exhausted is a bad idea. But he can't see any feasible way of just waiting the winter out either; last year, winter killed almost a quarter of the survivors in their group. 

"Ugh," the kid says, and Brett looks up to see him rolling his eyes. "Okay, what's your deal?" he asks flatly. "Where's your food? Your pack? Supplies? Seriously, where are you hiding it all?"

"I don't have anything," Brett replies. "Sorry to disappoint."

"You didn't," the kid says snippily. "Although it's kind of fucked up that you've survived this long by winging it." He starts to lower the crossbow, then says, "I have three knives and two handguns on me - if you attack me I will fucking kill you, I swear to God," and then swings his bag off his back. 

Brett watches him uneasily, and he's downright blown away when the kid produces a small package and a can. "Here," he says, clearly still irritated. "Take this."

He slides them across the ground, and Brett catches them with his foot, then picks them up. "What's this?"

"Food, idiot," the kid snaps. "You're welcome by the way." He shoulders his pack again. "Head south," he says brusquely. "There's a tunnel out of the city. It'll take you a few days to trek there but it's the fastest way I know of. Stay low during the day. Move at night. I'm not the only person in this city."

"Hey," Brett calls.

The kid turns back to him. 

"Where's your group?" Brett asks. Because seriously, this kid's young. There's no way he could've made it this far on his own.

"I don't have one," the kid says. "Not that it's any of your business." 

"Why didn't you kill me?" Brett demands.

For the first time, some of the harshness falls away from the kid's face, and he looks kind of lost and uncertain. "You didn't give me a reason to," he says quietly. 

Fuck. Brett's been okay on his own till now, but seeing another person has made him realise just how lonely he is. How much he wants company. And he doubts this guy could be bad news to have around; he's a walking arsenal if what he says is true, and he's clearly got the hunting skills to track and kill large animals, judging by the pack of dried meat in his hands. 

"You wanna come with me?" Brett asks.

"What?" the kid asks flatly. 

"To Oakridge. You wanna come with me? How come you haven't left the city before now? You know the way out-"

"I'm waiting for someone," the kid says. He sighs, rubs his face irritably, then says, "if you really don't know the way out, I can show you how to get there in the morning. But it's too late to go that far now."

"That... would be good, actually," Brett says. He feels kind of embarrassed about it, but he's not gonna let his pride get in the way. "So... will we just meet back here in the morning, then?"

The kid looks him over again. "You got anything to make a fire with?"

"No," Brett says.

"Of course you don't," the kid snipes. "Follow me. And remember, I'll kill you if you give me a reason to." 

~*~

So this is the strangest day Brett's had for a while.

First he nearly gets attacked and killed by a group of walkers wearing nothing more than bikinis. Then he's rescued by this kid, only to get knocked out a few seconds later and wake up with no idea where he is. And then he finds out that the kid apparently followed him, though Brett's not sure why.

He follows the kid back - gold light paints the derelict city like swathes of colour right off a brush, as if their world is nothing more than a canvas, a depiction of some alternate reality in which survival has been reduced to its most basic components - food, water, and warmth.

Brett hasn't had any of those in varying different time periods. The last of his water he drank almost a whole day ago; he drank the bottle the kid gave him, but he's still parched, feeling sick and weak and his head is throbbing viciously. He's not about to ask for more, though; he's already struggling to keep up and his new companion looks pretty irritated about that. It's only when Brett notices the sun dipping quickly that he thinks maybe the approaching darkness is the reason, and not really to do with him as such.

Although he wouldn't rule that out. He keeps pace determinedly, following the kid down alleyways and cobbled backstreets and through open arcades. They never take a main road. In fact, Brett's beginning to think that the kid probably diverged from his original pathway to find Brett on the tram tracks, right in the heart of the city, on a large, three-lane road. 

Just as Brett's getting the idea that he might be seeing the last rays of light from the sun, the kid takes a sudden, sharp, right-handed turn and bounds effortlessly up a set of stairs. He takes out keys - Brett hasn't seen keys in so long he thinks he's hallucinating - and unlocks the door to one of the little townhouses lining the street.

Brett follows him up hesitantly, swallowing. The kid arches an eyebrow at him, then stands back and holds the door open. The apartment's on a street so narrow Brett wonders if cars could even fit down here before; still, it seems safe, and it's close to a lot of different places.

"Thanks," he murmurs as he steps inside. There's no entryway; stepping through the front door leads him straight into a living room, which is currently, blessedly warm with the heat of a low-burning fire. The kid shuts the door behind him and strides in.

"You hungry?"

He barely realises he's being spoken to until the kid snaps, "Hey. Asshole," to get his attention, and Brett looks up.

"Huh?"

"Are you hungry?" the kid repeats.He still looks pretty pissed off, but Brett supposes he's probably ruined this kid's whole day - it didn't seem to be in his plans to pick up a random stranger off the streets. Brett wonders why he did it; he was clearly out looking for supplies, if the overstuffed bag on his back is an indication. He didn't need to intervene, and he didn't need to stick around, either, but he did.

"Starving," Brett says.

"Okay." The kid puts his crossbow in the corner of the room. "Turn around," he demands. "Face the wall."

Brett obeys, because what else is he gonna do? He doesn't have any weapons and he's weak from hunger and thirst. He was kind of hoping the kid would offer him food - why else would he ask Brett if he's hungry?

He feels the kid's hands on him, patting him down. "Thought you frisked me before?" Brett asks.

"I'm a thorough kind of guy." 

"Yeah, I can tell." 

The kid seems satisfied, backs off, holsters his gun again, and says, "I've got deer or canned beans. Which do you want?" Then he stands back and looks at Brett expectantly. His eyes are startlingly clear - Brett hasn't seen anyone this focussed in a really, really long time. 

"You're feeding me?" Brett asks hopefully.

The kid gives him a long look. "You're pale," he says finally. "Shaking. Couldn't keep up with me on the way back, don't hear most of what I say, and even though you said you're starving, you're all squishy around your stomach. You need to eat." 

He's smart, Brett's gotta give him that. "Deer," he says. "Where'd you learn all that?"

"Nowhere. Sit down before you fall down."

Brett sits on a cushion near the fire and watches as the kid leaves the room, returning with some of the deer - how'd he catch a deer anyway? - and a few cans. "Eat as much as you want," he mutters as he passes the deer to Brett. "I've got plenty and you look like shit." 

He's sitting in front of a fire, feeling warm for the first time in months, in real human company for the first time in almost two months, and he's actually eating something. This is definitely a turn for the better.

He hopes this doesn't take a turn for the worst; it easily could, and Brett's heard horror stories like that. The kid doesn't seem mentally unstable - a little testy, sure, but who isn't now? - but he's packing a veritable arsenal of weaponry and he's alone, clearly, which Brett thought was bullshit at first, and he has to wonder about that. Why is the kid alone? Who would leave someone this young to their own devices? He can't imagine the kid left his group; it would be dangerously stupid. 

He doesn't even care that the kid has spent most of their time together eyeing him distrustfully. They'd walked what Brett thinks must be more than two miles to get back here - and Brett has to say, he's impressed. Because the kid has, apparently, managed to fortify one of the tiny little townhouses that function as very, very small apartments. Looking at it from the outside, you'd never know it was inhabited. 

The apartment itself is sort of nice, really. Brett assumes that this used to be the living room, but now it's got a large queen-sized bed in it, along with a small table in the corner and the area for the fire, which is built inside some kind of contraption designed to prevent it from burning through the floor.

_Kid might be alone_ , he thinks, _but he must be smart, because I don't know any adult who could build something like that. So he has the skills to hunt and scavenge, he's handy with the crossbow, and he can make a fire easily. And he's still alive._ That's a pretty big indication to Brett that this kid is smart - he knows stuff. 

Brett eyes the bed sleepily. It looks comfortable, warm. He hasn't slept in a bed for months. It looks comfortable, warm. He hasn't slept in a bed for months. He's tired, and he's sore, and he's still feeling pretty shaky and weak - he wishes there was more water available. The kid might have some, but if he does, he's not letting on. 

The kid sees him looking. "I'll give you a blanket," he mutters. "There's a roll-out bed in the next room."

"Did you do all this?"

"Just the fire pit. The rest was here when I found it."

There's a long pause. Then Brett says, "Are you here on your own?"

He's surprised when the kid nods. He didn't think he'd get an honest answer out of him. "Jesus," he murmurs. "How long?" So the kid is on his own. Brett kind of figured, what with the fact that his decision to take Brett in was made quickly, with apparently no thought given to any other person, but... alone? He can't be older than sixteen. 

"More than a year," the kid says. "I stopped counting." 

"Why didn't you try to find people?" Brett asks. It seems like a reasonable question; he doesn't know anyone who's survived alone for very long, let alone a teenager. This one even seems healthy, if not very happy. He's clearly not starving and he's got two healthy spots of colour in his cheeks. He just can't fathom why this kid would've thought being alone was a better option than seeking out people.

"People suck," the kid says simply.

"True that," Brett murmurs. "Hey, listen. Thanks for not killing me today, and for the food. You didn't have to do that."

"Yeah, well, you don't seem that bad," the kid mutters. 

Brett smiles. Yeah, he's sort of prickly, but the discovery of someone who doesn't want to kill him on sight and pillage him for everything he's got is still so novel that he doesn't mind how snappy and irritable this kid is. And really - he's feeding Brett, and food in the apocalypse is basically the only currency worth anything. That and medicine. He can't be as aggressive as he seems to be if he's willing to share.

"My name's Brett," he says.

The kid looks up at him, seeming surprised. He's quiet for a moment, taking Brett in, then says quietly, "I'm Liam." 

Liam. Liam's got bright, crystal clear, blue eyes, surrounded by a fan of stupidly long, dark gold lashes, an almost totally symmetrical face - Brett's photographer friends would have had a field day with him - and a small, slightly upturned nose. Cute, verging on being handsome, almost, and Brett absolutely did not just think that.

"Hi, Liam. Thanks for not killing me."

Liam gives him the smallest smile Brett's ever seen, like his muscles have forgotten the movement. Brett supposes they have; Liam's been without people longer than Brett has. 

"How old are you?" he asks.

"Seventeen," Liam says.

Fuck. Liam's a little older than Brett had initially thought, but that means Liam was probably only fifteen, maybe sixteen, when he ended up on his own. No wonder he's so prickly and aggressive, Brett thinks. It was the only way to keep people away from him.

"You?" Liam asks, almost like he's forgotten how to talk. He seems to be warming up to the idea of Brett in his space; he's a little less shifty, and he's more forthcoming with answers now. Brett has the sudden realisation that Liam doesn't have to engage him - he's more than done enough for Brett today just by saving him, let alone feeding him. But Liam's talking to him, even if it is softly and awkwardly.

"Twenty one."

"Thought you were older," Liam says. 

"I get that a lot. Guess it's 'cause I'm tall." He holds up the package of dried meat. "Guess I should give this back, right?"

Liam shakes his head. "Keep it," he says. "You'll probably need it for the road." 

"What about you?"

"I've got plenty," Liam says. "Do you want some more water?" 

Brett sighs. "Yes. Please."

Liam stands up, goes to the bed, and drags a bag out from underneath it, producing a water bottle from inside. He tosses it to Brett. "Let me know if you want more," he says. "I use the snow. Melt it and stuff. Purify it." He's speaking in short sentences, like he doesn't remember how to use longer ones, or like he wants to be irritated but can't quite bring himself to be. Brett watches him sit back down and put a pot over the fire before pouring some water into it.

Brett surveys Liam for a moment. He looks worn out - but doesn't everyone these days? - but not starved or underfed like a lot of people do. His eyes are startlingly blue. 

"Where're you getting it all from?" Brett wonders.

"I go hunting," Liam says. "The trick is getting to game before the zombies do." 

"And how do you do that?" Brett asks.

There's a long pause, like Liam's torn between telling him the truth and telling him to mind his own damn business. Brett doesn't push him; he's warm and thinks he might even be safe for the immediate future, and he isn't curious enough to jeopardise that.

Eventually, Liam must decide that giving up hunting knowledge probably won't damage his chances of survival, because he says, "I use the zombies."

"Huh?" Brett asks. "How?"

"They know where living things are better than we do," Liam says. "They're like, hardwired to find living things to snack on. So I find a set of tracks and follow them till I see a few zombies going the same way. If I stay far enough behind I can take out the game first, stop it running away, then the zombies before they eat it."

"That's really smart," Brett says. "Where'd you learn that?"

"Old friend," Liam says, and Brett knows - just by his tone, and the way he doesn't elaborate, that the old friend is probably not alive anymore. 

Liam stands up. "We should sleep," he says shortly. "It's a pretty long hike out to the tunnel tomorrow. I'll get you some blankets and stuff." As he stands up, he motions at the water bottle. "Drink some more water," he mutters. "You still look like shit."

Brett sits, waiting, until Liam reappears with a fold-out bed piled with blankets and, holy crap, a pillow. He falls down onto it gratefully and says, "I'm sleeping in here so you can kill me if I do something suspicious, aren't I?"

"Yep," Liam says. "Night."


	2. Chapter Two - You'll Never Leave Harlan Alive

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who read and commented! These chapters are pretty short but never mind. Hope you enjoy! ^_^

**Chapter Two - You'll Never Leave Harlan Alive**

When Brett cracks his eyes open in the morning, Liam's already up.

He's got a blanket wrapped around his shoulders, and he's poking sleepily at a pot over the fire pit. "Mornin'," he says, and his voice is soft and husky with sleep. He's also decidedly less aggressive; _not being attacked overnight must've done something to thaw him out_ , Brett thinks. _Or he just hasn't woken up enough to get all those cylinders firing._

In the light of dawn, Brett can see what he looks like more clearly - and now he can very clearly see that Liam's young. He's caught in that awkward stage between being a teenager and a man; Brett can see that there's hair on his face, but it's not rough or stubbly like his, like it's brand new. There's still a bit of softness around his jaw and mouth, and even with the muscles lacing his body, his collarbones are still fairly prominent, which is probably a sign he's not done growing. His skin looks pretty smooth. Brett takes in his face; full, pink lips, seemingly thousands of straight, pearly white teeth - even now, Jesus - and bright, piercing blue eyes. Even his eyebrows are beautiful, which Brett thinks is fucking stupid. Who the hell has beautiful _eyebrows_?

So, Brett's confusion comes from this: Liam's not tall, at all, not even close, but he is pretty muscular. He's a little more solid than Brett is, less tapered around the waist, but definitely not small. He'll probably never match Brett in height, though.

"Hope you like oatmeal," Liam says sleepily. "Also, it's rude to stare this early in the morning."

"Not awake enough to threaten my life yet?" Brett asks. "Oatmeal's great."

"Can't be bothered, more like," Liam says sourly. "I feel like if you were gonna attack me you would've done it by now."

"No need to be so bitter about it," Brett says, and realises, belatedly, that he's teasing the kid. For a moment, Liam bristles, opens his mouth to snap something - and then, quite suddenly, seems to realise Brett's joking and settles back down, looking confused and a little irritated.

"So," Liam says, apparently sick of this topic already, "brown sugar or banana strawberry?"

"Huh?" Brett asks blankly. Is Liam asking him about street drugs or something?

Liam lifts one of the pots. "Brown sugar," he says slowly, then motions to the other. "Banana strawberry. Which flavour do you want?"

"I get a choice?"

"Yeah," Liam says, his voice slowing more.

"Banana. I think."

Liam passes the pot to him. "If you're really stressed about it, you can take some with you," he says. And yeah - Brett's just remembered that he's not staying. 

He feels weird about that. Like he has some sort of obligation to take Liam with him, or watch out for him, or something. But Liam's here alone, by choice, so maybe he wants it to stay that way. But still. Brett doesn't feel right leaving Liam on his own.

"I'm not stressed," Brett replies.

"You must be the only person still alive who isn't," Liam counters.

"I dunno," Brett says. "You seem pretty relaxed."

"God, if I'm what constitutes as relaxed, everyone else must be rocking back and forth in the corner of a room, muttering bible verses," Liam mutters. Brett laughs. Liam's not exactly friendly or bursting with welcoming energy, but he's enjoying the deadpan snarking. 

There's a long silence. Liam's eating his oatmeal slowly, not looking at Brett with what seems like deliberate concentration. He might not want to talk; he might not want to get attached, Brett realises, considering this is only a very brief interlude in the chaos of trying to get from point A to B. 

"How're you feeling?" Liam asks curtly.

Brett blinks. "Much better. The food really helped."

"Food will do that when you're starving." 

Brett chooses to ignore that. "How'd you know all that stuff?" he asks. "The medical stuff that is."

Liam shrugs wordlessly. It's the second time Brett's tried to find out, and Liam's not forthcoming with the information, so he's not gonna try again. Instead, he tries for something else.

"What's your last name?"

"It's just Liam," he replies. "You?"

"Just Brett," Brett says lightly. He's not gonna give without getting. Liam doesn't seem bothered, and maybe this whole first-name-basis-only thing is another way of not getting too attached to him. Or maybe Liam just doesn't like him and can't wait for Brett to be on his way.

Liam motions at the oatmeal Brett's nursing. "Better eat," he says. "We're gonna leave soon."

Brett doesn't bother protesting. 

~*~

"So, are you gonna tell me why you're helping me?" Brett asks.

Liam jumps nimbly over a sandbag barricade. "Nope."

He's not as prickly or defensive as he was yesterday, but he's also not exactly forthcoming with information, either. He's carrying the crossbow again, but also has, from what Brett can see, a knife at his waist, one in his boot and a handgun on his thigh.

"That's nice," Brett says. "Just trying to make conversation."

"Don't need it." Brett notes the way Liam wields the crossbow like an extension of his arm. He decides, or rather reaffirms, that getting on Liam's bad side - pissing him off - is probably not such a wise idea.

"Have you scavenged the whole city?" Brett asks.

Liam shakes his head. "Some of it belongs to other people," he says. "I stay out of their way. I don't think they know I'm around, or I'd probably be dead."

"Isn't it safer to leave, if that's true?"

"Like I said. They don't know I'm here."

"But... you know about them," Brett says. "How?"

"Come close to their territory sometimes." Liam's striding confidently ahead of Brett. "They used to take in travellers," he says. "Not so much anymore."

"And you didn't?"

"Last people I tried to help shot at me," Liam replies. "Got me, actually. Grazed my arm. I was sixteen. I seriously thought I was gonna bleed to death until I realised the bullet wasn't actually inside me."

"What happened to them?" Brett asks. "Did you shoot back?"

Liam shakes his head. Then, quietly, "I tried to follow them. To see if they got out. Zombies got them in the tunnels. I told them not to go that way, right before they tried to kill me. I don't know. I don't think they deserved to die or anything." 

"Do you track people to make sure they leave?" Brett asks, "or do you track them to make sure they get out?"

Liam turns to look at him. He looks a bit perturbed by the question. "Uh," he says. "It depends. I don't - I don't think anyone deserves to die that way, you know? By getting torn apart and all that shit. But I guess I mostly track them to make sure they leave. Especially once I don't trust them, I wanna make sure they aren't coming back for me."

"What about me?" Brett asks.

Liam scowls. "You're okay, I guess."

Brett laughs; it's way too easy to stir Liam up. "So you don't want me to die?" he teases.

Liam looks at him, clearly irritated. "I didn't five minutes ago."

"Oh, that's lovely," Brett says, but he's still smiling. Liam doesn't actually seem to mind being teased; Brett wonders if he has an older brother or something. He wants to ask about Liam's family, but he feels like that would be off limits - if Liam's family was alive, he would probably be with them right now. 

Not for the first time, he wonders how Liam survived this long, whether he's always lived in this city or whether he travelled here, maybe in the early days, when a lot of the cities were falsely reported as safe zones. He thinks the spread of misinformation did more harm than the zombies did, really. Too many people rushing to crowded areas, no escape routes... there aren't many people left in general. 

"How many groups do you see come through here?" Brett asks. 

Liam shrugs. "Used to be a couple every week," he says. "In the beginning. Big groups, too. Sometimes they tried to stay. Then it became a few every month. And then smaller groups, every couple of months." He hesitates, then turns back to Brett. "You're the first person I've met in about six months who hasn't tried to kill me. To be honest, I'm still kind of expecting you'll try at some point. But that's why I'm armed and you're not."

"What if you tried to kill me?"

"Why would I save you from zombies and shank you later?" Liam demands. 

"I dunno. To eat me?"

Liam wrinkles his face up in a hilarious display of disgust. "Dude. Ew. There's just some lines you don't cross."

"I bet someone has somewhere," Brett says.

"Well, I haven't met them yet. Thank God." Liam turns to him. "You really think people like that are out there?" he asks, seeming disturbed. 

"Maybe." Brett doesn't want to think about it too much. "I hope not."

Liam nods. Brett thinks, again, that it can't be safe for Liam to be out here all on his own - but at the same time, Liam did say he'd been out here for more than a year, which means he must be doing something right. 

Liam sets a pretty hard pace, and Brett's sweating just trying to keep up with him. It's true that Brett's still not really recovered from nearly dying of starvation and thirst, but he's feeling pretty wounded that Liam - who's at least a foot shorter than him, give or take a few inches - is managing to do it easily. 

They walk for hours. Occasionally, they stop to eat or drink something, but it's never for long; Brett starts to see why as the sun reaches its peak in the sky, then, slowly, begins to drop down. Liam was right about not having much time. 

Finally, they round a corner, and there it is - the tunnel looms openly at them, cars around the entrance, a few corpses here and there. 

"This is it," Liam says. "Go straight through. Don't turn, don't stop. You'll be on the outside after about five miles. It's a bit of a hike."

Brett nods. "Thanks, Liam," he says, and he means it. 

Liam shrugs uncomfortably, staring at the ground. "Yeah," he says finally.

"You know you can come with me," Brett says. "Get out of the city."

Liam shakes his head. "Told you," he says softly. "I'm waiting for someone. A few someones, actually. I can't really go."

Brett wants to tell Liam that he's been waiting over a year and nobody has showed up, but he knows it's pointless - and that it'll hurt Liam more than it'll spur him into action. He's seen it before, people who just won't move on despite the fact that their loved ones are probably dead. Nothing he says will make a difference; Liam will stay and wait until he's accepted there's no point.

"Okay," Brett says. "I feel bad for leaving you though."

"Don't," Liam says. "Go find your friends."

"If I ever see you again," Brett says, "I'll repay the favour. Maybe I'll get to save your life for once." 

Liam smiles. "Yeah. Maybe." He shifts and looks past Brett. "You'd better get going," he says. "There's not a lot of daylight left and you aren't gonna want to be in the tunnel when it gets dark." 

_I wish you were coming with me_ , Brett thinks sadly. He's imagining more years of loneliness for Liam, and it kind of sucks, makes it hard to nod and agree. 

"Thanks," he says. "For everything."

"No problem," Liam says. "So... guess I'll not see you later or anything. Good luck. Don't get munched on."

"I won't. You too."

They split after that, and Brett's stomach is in knots, thinking about Liam going back to that tiny apartment to be alone. Is that weird? He's known the guy for what, a day? He figures it's just because he knows what it's like to be alone, and Liam's the first person Brett's seen in a long time who's acted with compassion. 

At least he gets to walk more slowly now. There is that. He still goes pretty fast, because, well, Liam's right - he doesn't want to be in the tunnel when the light dies. 

He loses track of time. Instead, he thinks about what he's going to do once he leaves the tunnel - how he's gonna bunk down for the night. He's not sure if there's shelter outside. He should've asked Liam - then, Liam never specified how he got here, only that it was more than a year ago. He probably wouldn't have even remembered. 

The tunnel's getting darker, and something's beginning to smell like rot, like death. Brett fumbles for the flashlight Liam gave him, somewhat begrudgingly, but without being asked. 

The light from the end lands on what looks like thousands of walkers, all staggering towards him. As soon as the light hits them, they begin to snarl and snap their jaws, their pace speeding up.

Brett's heart drops as he turns around to try and go back, only to find that he's almost completely hemmed in. And that's when he remembers - they're quiet when they aren't disturbed, and they don't necessarily react to smell, but other stimuli like sound. And light. 

He books it. Before he's even aware of what he's doing he's racing between parked cars, but there are walkers falling out of them everywhere and he thought Liam said this tunnel was safe, for crying out loud-

Something grabs his shoulder, and he turns to see the sagging, rotting face of a child walker looming at him, jaws open wide, and he's raising a hand to punch it when an arrow cleaves cleanly through its forehead.

"Brett!"

He turns around - Liam's standing on top of one of the parked cars, his crossbow out. "Get onto the cars!" Liam yells. "They can't climb!"

Brett hauls himself onto the roof of an SUV and begins running over the tops of the cars, jumping above the walkers until he reaches Liam. Liam, who's sunk a fair few arrows into the zombies posing Brett the most danger.

"Nothing ever goes according to plan," Liam rages as he leaps over the gaps in the cars. "Fucking nothing. World's gone to shit." 

Those three sentences pretty much sum up everything that's happened since the outbreak, but Brett's too busy fleeing for his life to remark on that. 

They stay on the cars for a while, until Liam jumps down and says, "we're faster on the ground," and Brett follows him. He tries to keep track of Liam's body zig-zagging its way through the buildup, and eventually, they come to a stop outside the tunnel. 

Brett turns to Liam pretty much immediately. Liam's sweating, and he looks pretty pale and freaked out, but he's alive. "Are you good?" he asks Brett. "You didn't get bitten?"  
"I'm okay," Brett says, kind of having trouble believing it. "You?"

"All good." 

They stare at each other for a moment. Liam hasn't put his crossbow away. 

"You followed me," Brett pants. "Again. Why?" 

Liam gives him a long look, almost searching. Then, quietly, "I wanted to make sure you got out."

_Not to make sure I left,_ Brett realises. _He followed me to make sure I got out. So I didn't get eaten, which I would have if he hadn't followed._

"You saved my life again," Brett says. "Thank you."

Liam rewards him with a tiny, awkward smile. "Twice."

"Three times," Brett says. "Twice from zombies. You fed me, remember? Starvation would've got me if you hadn't."

"Well, you might starve tonight," Liam says. "It's too dark to try and go back now, but there are a few places we can hole up until morning." 

"You're taking me with you?" Brett asks.

"If you want me to," Liam says, seemingly feeling awkward again. "You don't have to come with me if you don't want. I mean. It's up to you."

Brett steps towards him. "Where are these magical places to hide?" he asks.

Liam cracks another small smile and turns. "Follow me." His pace isn't as fast as it has been all day, like he's tired or something. "I have one every mile or so," he says. "That I cleared out. Just in case I got stuck somewhere. Seemed safer than winging it." 

Brett puts a hand on Liam's shoulder, noticing the way he jumps at the sensation. "Hey," he says. "Thanks for sticking your neck out for me. And for taking me in and feeding me and stuff. For trying to get me out."

Liam doesn't shrug him off. "I'm still gonna get you out of here," he says. "This is just a setback. I'll find another way."

"Does it have to be this way?" Brett asks.

"This is the safest," Liam says. "There are only seven ways out of the city and about twenty four in. But about four of those seven ways are in the territory of another group - I think I mentioned them to you. They're not friendly, so we can't go that way. This tunnel has a herd in it. The other two I'm not sure of - they're much further away."

"How much further?"

"Two days, at least," Liam says. "By foot. It didn't used to take as long. With all the blockades set up around the city, though, it's hard to get through." 

Brett nods. He boosts himself up onto a ledge and reaches down to help Liam up. Liam accepts his help readily, sighing when he manages to haul himself up.

"What's up?" Brett asks.

"Tired. I'm usually sleeping by now." 

"Sorry," Brett says.

Liam gives a soft laugh. "Doesn't matter. If it's your life in exchange for my sleep, well, easy trade."

"I can go back," Brett says, pointing over his shoulder. Liam laughs again, a little louder this time. Brett's enjoying the sound, and the soft little smile that's playing around Liam's face. He wonders how long it's been since Liam laughed. It's been a long time since he's heard anyone laugh, so it's a pleasant sound to hear. 

They walk mostly in silence to - well, wherever Liam's going. Brett's amazed by the way Liam's memorised entire streets, towns and swathes of the city - he knows exactly where he's going and walks confidently ahead, crossbow half-raised with caution.

"This place would have been pretty before," Brett murmurs, taking in the beaten, worn-down brick pathways, soaring storefronts, and nature around them. The nature is overtaking everything now, of course; there are trees tangled with powerpoles, vines crawling into bars and screen doors, and a general sense of desertion in the whole area.

Liam doesn't say anything for almost a whole two or three minutes, and Brett thinks he can't be bothered talking, or doesn't want to, or just finds Brett annoying. Then, quietly, "It's kinda scary how quick nature took over once it all went to shit. Everything kind of just... grew over, or fell apart."

Brett's shocked to hear him talk, let alone give an opinion. "Yeah. Humans always thought they had control, but..." He looks around at the thriving flora and fauna, at the dilapidated, crumbling buildings. "Just goes to show we're only borrowing the land, I guess. It's not really our planet."

Liam nods a little, but stays silent. Brett gives him five minutes to say something - Liam does talk, he just takes a while to get there, by the looks of it - but the silence stretches on, and it becomes clear that Liam's not going to weigh in again.

"Where were you when it hit?" Brett asks softly.

Liam turns a corner; the sun is suddenly glaring into their faces, and Brett watches him flinch with surprise and narrow his eyes. The light's beaming at them from between a row of buildings, glittering off shattered glass and wet leaves like the world's made of diamonds.

"Not here," Liam says.

"Not here?" Brett asks, turning. "Did you see something?"

"No, I mean - I wasn't here."

"Oh," Brett murmurs. It's becoming clear that Liam won't tell him what is, only what isn't. Liam doesn't ask him where he was, and Brett doesn't volunteer the information; Liam seems closed off again, like he's done talking.

They make it to Liam's little hideout just before nightfall, and, once Liam's managed to start up a fire, Brett takes out the deer in his pack so they can eat. After a while, he starts talking - about nothing in particular, really - and Liam hangs on to every word he utters.

With his voice getting hoarse, Brett clears his throat and says, "Your turn."

Liam blushes. "I don't have much to talk about," he says. "I was fifteen when this started. The last significant thing that happened to me was getting onto the lacrosse team at my high school."

"At fifteen?" Brett asks, waiting until Liam nods to say, "that's pretty impressive."

Liam smiles but doesn't say anything, looks down at his dried deer. Brett cocks his head to the side. Liam's awkward, but it's sort of endearing - it's also nice to know he's not as scary or as axe-crazy as he comes across.

"So," Brett says, "is it okay if I use one of your little hidey-holes while I'm here?"

"You can stay with me," Liam says softly.

"Really?" Brett asks. "Wouldn't I be invading your space?"

Liam shrugs. "I don't mind if you stay," he says. "But you've gotta chip in. Help me scavenge for supplies and stuff."

"I can do that," Brett agrees readily. "Seriously, you saved my life. I have to return the favour somehow."

Liam's looking away from him again. "It's okay," he says. "I didn't do it so you'd owe me. So just, you know, pitch in where you can. That'll be fine."

Brett nods, smiles. "Okay."


	3. Chapter Three - Readjustment Period

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's just the week for updating I guess. Glad everyone's enjoying this so far! This chapter's from Liam's POV ^_^

**Chapter Three - Readjustment Period**

Two days, five hours, and some spare change. That's how long Brett has been in Liam's presence.

Liam's pretty sure he's giving off the impression of someone who is simultaneously constipated and eating lemons, but that's okay with him. Better than his new "friend" (read: freeloader) working out that it's actually not that Liam hates him - Liam's just wigging out, because it's been a long fucking time since he even had to talk to anyone, let alone share space with them. 

So, yeah - wigging out. Liam is really not adaptable in the slightest. He's not good with change. He's not good with people. Wasn't before the outbreak and, well, the presence of zombies and rapists and murderers has really just exacerbated the problem. 

He knows, by now, that Brett probably doesn't want to hurt him. He hasn't put it past the guy to try and loot him, but hey. That's why Liam sleeps with a knife under his pillow, right? It's under control. 

Besides which, he's pretty sure Brett thinks he has multiple personalities. Which, at this point, with the amount of internal monologuing he does just to stay sane, he really might. He's running hot and cold when he talks to Brett, yo-yoing between being icy and prickly and being kind of okay to be around. He can't be easy to be around, he knows that, but Brett hasn't called him on it. 

And he's sort of stupidly good looking. Blue eyes, like Liam, but icier than his, lighter. Curly blonde hair. He looks muscular, if a little thin because of starvation, but other than that, healthy. And he's fucking ridiculously tall. 

"Hey."

Liam looks up at Brett. The guy is watching him closely. "You zoned out," Brett says.

"Maybe you were just boring me," Liam gripes. _Way to go, Dunbar_ , he tells himself moodily. _You're gonna make loads of friends at this rate._

Brett doesn't seem to mind too much. "I was asking if there's anywhere to shower?" he asks sheepishly. "Or at least get clean?"

"Not here." Liam focuses on whittling at the stick he's got in his hands. He doesn't like making eye contact with Brett. Brett's kind of stupidly pretty. 

Of all the fucking things he thought would be an issue in an apocalypse, being gay wasn't one of them. He really did not think he would be so sex-starved that when he met a stranger for the first time in over a year, his instincts would be torn between killing them on sight and fucking them senseless. 

He blames hormones. It might be the apocalypse, but he's seventeen. And to be honest, Brett being pretty and non-psychotic is probably the only reason Liam hasn't shanked him yet.

In short? Liam's stupid dick is the only reason Brett's still alive. Then again, Liam doesn't care what his dick thinks - if Brett attacks him Liam's gonna end his life on the spot. Hormones be damned. 

"Man, you are not good at listening," Brett says idly.

"I haven't had to listen to anyone in a year," Liam says irritably. "What were you saying?"

"I was asking where I could get clean around here."

"There's a sort of stream," Liam answers, trying to be less salty. Okay, he's spent a lot of time in his own head the last year. His monologues are the only thing to keep him company. That's not his damn fault. It's everyone else's for being so stupid and bloodthirsty and tyrannical and generally untrustworthy. "I'll show you today," he adds on the end.

Brett smiles at him, and Liam looks away hastily. "Thanks," Brett says. "You know, I know it must suck for you to have someone invading your space and everything. But I really am grateful you're letting me stay."

Liam's first instinct, of course, is to snap, but he stops himself from doing it. Just. "You're welcome," he mumbles awkwardly. "Also, sorry I'm an asshole. I haven't had to self-edit for over a year. Guess I'm rusty."

Brett shrugs. "You might be salty," he says, "but you're also sharing your food and your fire with me. Honestly, that's enough to make me like you. You're the friendliest person I've met for a few months."

"Wow," Liam says. "I feel sorry for you."

He's surprised when Brett laughs, but it's also sort of nice to hear. He tries to hide his blushing as he finishes whittling down the stick and hands it to Brett. "Here."

"What's this?" Brett asks him curiously, turning it over in his hands.

"Spear," Liam says simply. "If you wanna start coming out with me, you need a weapon of some kind, and I'm sort of attached to mine." 

"Don't blame you," Brett says. "That's a cool crossbow."

"Damn near killed myself the first time I tried to reload it," Liam says. "It's heavy as hell, too." 

"Guess if you ran out of bolts you could just bludgeon a zombie to death," Brett muses. "Ever done that?"

"Don't let 'em get close enough." Liam stands up. "Come on. I'll show you where that stream is."

"Is it far?"

"Not really," Liam says. "Maybe a mile or so." 

"Alright. Lead the way."

At least, Liam reasons with himself, he's not trying to take over or force Liam to do as he says just because he's older. Liam's had a bit of that, from adults who, in the apocalypse, had no business telling him what to do. They all died later anyway, as far as he knows, and he's still here. Reluctantly, sometimes, but still here.

"You keep a pretty fast pace," Brett comments as he tags along behind Liam.

"You want me to slow down?"

"No," Brett says, but Liam can hear how breathless he is and grins to himself. "Just - you know. You've got short legs. You're fast."

"I've got short everything," Liam says. "It's a pain in the ass. Didn't matter before, but it does now." 

"You're getting by better than me," Brett says. "I've lost count of how many times I've almost croaked."

"Getting by 'cause I'm alone," Liam says. "I don't have to watch out for anyone else. I um, I sort of stopped trying after a while."

Brett doesn't ask him why, which Liam's grateful for, and they walk mostly in silence until they reach the stream Liam spoke of. He thinks it might've been part of a park, once, but now it's begun flowing elsewhere without humans to maintain it, creating a natural pool in between two low-roofed cafes. 

"Are there fish?" Brett asks.

"Sometimes. Not this time of year, though." Liam sets his things down and begins stripping, shivering a little. "The water's gonna freeze soon," he explains. "Winter and all that."

"So it snows?"

"Yeah. It's fuckin' cold. The reason I found you was because I was out looking for supplies - stockpiling for winter so I don't have to go out as much. You lose daylight, you lose heat, start losing your mind eventually."

"Speaking from experience?"

"Sort of." Liam steps into the water; Brett's looking away from him, which is kind of polite and also kind of funny. "Seen it happen way too many times. Lots of old people die in winter. And summer, too."

"Really?"

"Yeah. The weather's too extreme. Babies too."

"People still have babies?" He can hear Brett stripping off behind him, keeps his eyes forward as he reluctantly splashes himself with water. 

"Yeah. I haven't seen many, but they're around." 

Liam turns around once he knows Brett's in, and he feels his mouth dry out almost instantly. 

Brett's got tattoos.

Liam tries not to stare, but fuck, he really likes tattoos, and he's always wanted one - a pipe dream now - and Brett's got a few. Script, on his ribcage, what looks like wings on his arms, and a mandala design that takes up most of his chest. And fuck, Liam's dick likes that even more than it likes Brett's hair or eyes.

He turns away, cursing his libido for being literally the only part of him that's still healthy and functioning normally after all this, and tries to think about the zombies having sex. He reckons that'll do it. Probably.

The water's too icy cold for him to stay under the stream for long; he stays long enough to wet his hair and scrub the grime and sweat off his body, but then he's out, still shivering once he's done drying off and dressing, and berating himself for even looking twice at Brett. 

"Liam?" Brett calls.

Fucking fuck. "Yeah?"

"You okay? You didn't stay in long."

"I'm okay. I'm cold." It's the truth, so he's not worried Brett will pick up on anything amiss. 

_Seriously. You're fucking seventeen years old. On the off chance he is gay, or bi, or whatever, he's still four years older than you. There's no way._

His dick, apparently, does not get the memo, because that night he dreams about Brett climbing on top of him and fingering him open and then fucking him, and he wakes up so painfully hard he can't get his hand around his dick fast enough. He's lucky Brett's in the other room, because he comes hard and fast, thighs shaking as he imagines Brett screwing him steadily into the mattress. 

He remembers Garrett, feels guilty, and can barely look at Brett for the rest of the day. He's not sure he'll ever tell Brett about Garrett. About being gay. It's a complicated mess by itself, without adding the zombie apocalypse to the mix. 

And before he might have. But now it's looking like Brett's gonna be around for a while, because Liam can't find him a safe way out of the city and winter is really beginning to settle in and make itself known. He doesn't want to get attached anyway. Brett said he's looking for people, and that means he'll leave, while Liam will stay here.

Brett's stayed the longest out of any of Liam's guests. But that doesn't make him different. Just an exception.

He must be even more standoffish than usual, because halfway through the day Brett puts a hand on his shoulder - and Liam just about leaps out of his skin, it's been so long since he's felt human touch - and says, "You okay?"

"Yeah. Fine. Why?" 

"You seem kind of moody," Brett says.

"I'm always moody," Liam responds automatically. 

Brett smiles. "True."

Brett's trying to engage him in conversation, but all Liam can think about is Garrett and how he died and why he died and he's eventually so consumed by the guilt and emotion that he packs up a bag, utters a curt, "I'm going hunting," and leaves the apartment, not caring if Brett's realised they've got plenty of food. 

He heads right out to the closest skyscraper he can find and climbs all the way to the roof, sits on the edge and shivers as he watches the sun climb higher and higher and then, eventually, begin to sink. And he thinks about Garrett. His mom and dad. His friends from school. The group who took him in at the beginning. He thinks about all those people and their ghosts, living in between the cracks of his mind, and he can't stop crying.

Mason and the others probably never made it out. Fuck, he knows that. But he can't leave here. It's not precisely that he wants to stay, because that's not it at all. It's more like he can't leave. He doesn't feel like he's earned an escape from this place and all the undead and the constant threat of the Keepers expanding their territory. 

He's either going to leave or he's going to die here, and that scares the shit out of him. He doesn't know what he wants from life that he can reasonably ask for anymore, but he does know he doesn't want to die alone with nobody any the wiser to the fact. 

Play smart, not hard. That's what his stepdad would say. But what's smart? Leaving the city, when he has no idea what's on the outside waiting for him? Staying in the city even though there's increasingly less resources and more and more danger? 

And what about Brett? Where does Brett fit into all this? How can he safely get Brett out of the city and watch him go and feel nothing? Yeah, he's not used to the company, at all, but that doesn't mean he isn't tentatively enjoying it, and he thinks he might snap if he has to go back to endless days of silence. 

He feels like he's morally obligated to tell Brett that he's unstable as fuck and probably not the best company and not at all even close to being okay, but he's not sure how and not sure he wants to. Maybe he just wants Brett's company for a bit, until he leaves, and then...

And then what? He's not sure. He doesn't know. What he does know is that the sun is going down and he's begun shivering, so he hauls ass off the rooftop and heads back to the apartment. 

When he gets in, Brett stands up, looking shaken. "Jesus," he says. "I thought a biter must've got you."

And then he falls silent, because he must have seen the tear tracks on Liam's cheeks, and Liam's too tired and too sore - in his chest, his heart, whatever bits of him carry his soul - to give a shit about Brett seeing him this low. Brett's gonna be gone in a week anyway. It's not like it fucking matters any if he sees Liam lose his mind a bit.

He sits down by the fire, shaking. He hears Brett move, but he's beyond caring about getting stabbed. He's not sure what he's even alive for. What the point is.

"Here," Brett says quietly. There's a blanket landing over Liam's shoulders then. "You should try to warm up," Brett continues, his voice soft. "You were out in the cold a lot."

"Thanks." Liam drags the blanket closer and shuts his eyes, still trembling. He's not all that sure what's getting to him now, although it's probably the fact that he's acting like he's completely unhinged and Brett's... being pretty nice. He's known Liam two days, and he's being warm. Tender. And Liam didn't think there were any good people left in this world, not after the last time he tried to help someone.

They go to bed early, and Liam wakes with the sun the next morning, grabs a map and some breakfast and heads out to the front steps of the townhouse. He stares down at the web of roads depicted on the map and realises the next closest tunnel is well over a day's hike away.

He puts his head down. He promised Brett he'd get him out of the city, but it's beginning to look like that might be a difficult thing to do. Half of these tunnels, at the very least, belong to the Keepers, and he knows there's no way in hell he's gonna be able to get Brett out that way.

And winter is coming on fast. There's that as well. Liam can't really let Brett leave in the middle of winter and still have his conscience remain intact; winter kills more people through exposure and sickness now than the zombies do. It's shit no one thinks of that gets them killed; yeah, they're packing heat for the walkers but nobody thinks to get iodine tincture to purify water so you don't end up shitting through the eye of a needle, and nobody thinks about the fact that canned food is running low and maybe they should preserve that unless there's no other way.

Nobody fucking thinks, Liam thinks moodily. And that's why most people are either dead or have their foot halfway in the grave by now.

He hears the door open, then close. Brett's standing there, looking at him and seeming disconcerted.

"Thought you'd ditched me," he says.

"And why would I do something like that?" Liam asks. "This is my place."

"This is my swamp!" Brett says, and Liam blinks.

"Is that... Shrek...?"

"Yeah. Sorry."

Liam sighs. "Never gonna see Shrek again," he mumbles gloomily. 

Brett sits down next to him, doesn't say anything for a minute. Then, "I was more of a Toy Story kind of guy."

"Man," Liam says. "The last movie wrecked me. You know, when all the toys were holding hands in the incinerator? I cried like a fucking bitch." 

Brett laughs. "You? Crying?"

"Yeah."

"So you're soft," Brett teases. "Squishy."

Liam flips him off, but he's kind of enjoying the teasing. "You know what's soft and squishy?" Liam asks.

"What?"

"Your insides. Bet they don't withstand being stabbed."

"It'd just be a waste to shank me now, Liam. I mean. You've spent three days feeding me and saving my ass. Think of all those resources."

"Oh, I'm gonna make you go out and find stuff to replace what you've eaten," Liam says absently. "Before I shank you, that is."

Brett laughs a little. "Somehow I don't think you're gonna do that."

"I might just to prove I can," Liam says.

"Nah. I've met crazies. You're kind of salty, but you aren't crazy." 

"... Thanks?"

"Don't mention it." 

That night, Liam's feeling all sorts of weird and charitable and kind of, well, warm, because Brett's company and he's even sort of good company, which Liam didn't expect. So that night he gives Brett another blanket and tells him to move the cot back into the main room, near the fire. Yeah, Liam made him sleep out here the first night, but it was only to watch him like a hawk; after that, he moved the cot back into one of the spare rooms. 

But he actually kind of actively cares if Brett lives or dies or gets sick, so the main room it is. And falling asleep to the sight of another live human being nearby isn't exactly unwelcome either.

He falls asleep watching the firelight flicker over Brett's face, and for the first time in a long time, he doesn't dream.


	4. Chapter Four - How To Make Friends and Influence People

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's just been a productive writing week. Probably because I'm avoiding my real-world responsibilities. ANYWAY, hope you all enjoy! Thanks for the awesome feedback on the last few chapters! :D

**Chapter Four - How To Make Friends And Influence People**

Brett's thinking of writing a book.

He'd have to write it by hand, of course, because computers have been a thing of the past for years now, but he thinks it'd be worth writing - just as a reference guide.

This book of his, he's decided, will be titled "How To Get Along With a Seventeen Year Old Apocalypse Hermit who only Begrudgingly Tolerates Your Existence". Because seriously, he thinks he's making pretty good headway considering Liam still thinks Brett's gonna shank him in his sleep.

He's been here a week. It's been a week of actually eating and sleeping and being warm, which is nice - but Liam hasn't really taken him anywhere. There've been days when he wakes up to find Liam gone and goes to sleep hoping he's alright out there, only to rise the next morning and find that Liam's back, in bed, asleep.

So Liam must be doing something. He goes out with Brett sometimes - to the stream where they bathed the second day, once or twice just to get out of the townhouse. But mostly Liam leaves Brett to his own devices, without asking him to do anything.

Brett does what he can. Purifies water, rations out food, tries to keep the little townhouse clean. He thinks Liam appreciates it, though he can't be sure, because so far, what he's seen indicates that Liam has two moods - sour, and a little less sour.

About a week and a half after he's been forced to turn back, Brett wakes up to Liam, sitting near the fire and cooking breakfast, his face stormy.

"Morning," he says sleepily.

"Hey." Liam hands him a bowl almost as soon as he sits up. 

"So you decided to stick around this morning," Brett says conversationally.

"Yeah. I've got bad news," Liam says.

Brett's stomach turns. "Are you...?"

Liam blinks. "Am I what?" he asks, mystified.

"Did you get bitten while you went out?" Brett asks hesitantly, not sure he wants to know.

"No," Liam says. "If I get bitten I'm putting a bullet through my head straight away. No point delaying the inevitable. Anyway, that's not what I was gonna say anyway."

"Oh," Brett mumbles.

"Look, I've gone out almost every day to try and figure out how to get you out of here," Liam says. "And I can't find a way that isn't blocked. The first tunnel has zombies, the second is pretty much caved in, and the third one is well over a week's hike away by the time we get around anything. It'll be snowing by then. The rest aren't accessible."

"Why?" Brett asks.

"I'm not the only person in this city," Liam says. "I told you that. The rest of them are on the other side of town, controlled by other people who don't like to share." 

Brett nods, then says, "So... that's what you've been doing all week, huh? Looking for an exit? Are you that desperate to have me gone?" He's joking, but something about his tone must be amiss - or maybe the words themselves are enough to piss Liam off, because Liam levels him with an acidic glare.

"I'm not desperate to have you gone," he snaps. "It's shitty to have to wait for people and have them never show up. Just wanna get you to your friends, preferably in one piece."

Brett winces; he's clearly touched a nerve when Liam already wasn't in the mood. "Sorry," he says. "And thanks. For trying."

Liam's still glaring at him, but it softens a little bit after Brett's apology, and he redirects his gaze to the fire. They sit in strained, uncomfortable silence for a while - Liam's not even doing anything, he's just sitting and glaring like he's hoping to turn the entire apartment into flames - until Brett finishes his breakfast and clears his throat awkwardly.

"I am sorry," he says.

"It's fine," Liam mutters. "I'm just an asshole." 

Brett smiles. "You're not that bad."

"Uh huh," Liam says. "Just wait until you meet normal people again. Then you'll realise, wow, that guy Liam? He bashed me over the head and threatened to kill me. What a fucking _prick_."

Brett's laughing now, because he's at least ninety percent sure that now Liam's making a conscious effort to be less abrasive, and this might be his way of joking around, even though it's hard to tell. "Well, you didn't kill me," Brett says. "There's that." 

Liam scoffs. "Remember when not killing people was just kind of expected, and not seen as an act of kindness and compassion?"

Brett smiles. "Maybe it'll be like that again one day."

"Maybe." But Liam sounds unconvinced. He stands up, heads over to the table in the corner, and pulls a machete and knife off it. "Here," he says, holding them out to Brett.

Brett blinks. "You've suddenly decided to give me weapons?"

"Yeah," Liam sighs. "Looks like you're gonna be here a while. Fastest way for me to get killed is if you get in shit and can't defend yourself." He rolls his shoulders. "I also really don't think you're going to kill me," he adds, "so please, for the love of God, don't prove me wrong." 

"Why today?" Brett asks.

"We're going out," Liam says. "You've gotta be getting bored in here." 

"I am," Brett says, standing up to follow Liam. "But why?"

"I need some help ransacking some places," Liam says. "Also, I feel bad about just locking you inside. You're not a prisoner or anything." 

They head down the steps. It's pretty chilly out, even with a few layers of insulation. Liam sets the same brisk pace as he did when he tried to escort Brett out, and Brett, for the most part, manages to keep up this time.

"Feeling better?" Liam asks.

"Huh?"

"You're keeping up," Liam comments. "You must be feeling a lot better." 

"Yeah. Sleep, food, all that. They're good. Nice to be able to actually rest inside."

Liam hefts his crossbow onto a platform barricading the front of a chemist, then begins to try and haul himself up. "You weren't before?" he asks.

Brett boosts him a little. "No," he says. "Before I met you I'd been alone for a month or two. Even before that my group had been displaced and we were just wandering around trying to find enough food to survive. We kept getting turned back by herds every time we tried to go somewhere different." 

Liam's finished wriggling up onto the platform, leans down to help Brett. "How many of there were you?" he asks curiously.

"We started off big," Brett says. "Over a hundred initially, holed up in a school. Just kept dwindling. The first winter wiped out almost a quarter of us." 

Liam nods, leading the way around to a fire escape that goes to the roof. "Exposure kills more people than walkers do now," he says. "Was it flu?"

"Yeah. Some type of really aggressive pneumonia. Didn't see it coming. The old people got sick first."

Liam nods. "I've seen it," he says. "Nasty stuff. Couple of groups that came through here the first winter had sick people. Kids, old people, weak people, you know? They get it easier. Coughing drew the zombies to them. Then they wouldn't leave people behind." 

Brett sighs. "Did they die?"

"Some," Liam says. "I got a few out. But most of the time there wasn't anything I could do." 

"It sounds like you saw a lot of people," Brett says. "But where you live is a long way from the tunnels."

There's a pause; Liam deems the chemist useless and begins to climb back down the ladder. Once Brett joins him - thinking the conversation has been abandoned - Liam says, "I used to walk out to the tunnels every day."

"Every day?" Brett asks.

"Yeah. I was waiting for friends; we said we'd meet here." Liam's heading off in another direction now; Brett follows. "Then I dropped back to every second day, and then just every four or five days."

"Why?" Brett asks softly.

"I realised no one was coming," Liam says. "But I didn't wanna give up, you know? I didn't know how to. Sort of why I'm still here."

Brett mulls that over as they walk. Other than not killing him, this is a pretty big indicator that Liam's an okay guy - he cares enough about random people to try and help them, and he's still waiting loyally for his friends... even if they aren't coming anymore.

Brett stops when he notices that Liam’s not with him anymore. He spins around in a circle, and it takes him a moment so catch sight of Liam behind an abandoned tank.

“Liam?” he calls out softly.

Liam turns back to him, motions him over. Brett goes to him, trying not to smile when he notices Liam is standing on the tips of his toes to try and see into the tank.

“What’s up?” he asks.

“I’ve wanted to loot this tank for a while now,” Liam says. “I’ve never been able to do it on my own, though. Will you help me?”

“Yeah, sure. What do you want me to do?”

Liam looks irritated for a moment, but not at Brett. Finally, he says, “Can you boost me up?”

Fuck, Brett’s trying so hard not to smile - the idea that this tiny badass he’s found himself with could probably kill someone, but can’t reach half the stuff he wants to loot, is pretty fucking funny. “Sure,” he says, cupping his hands together.

He’s sort of surprised when Liam climbs him bodily, confidently, putting his foot in Brett’s hand and his hands on his shoulders to boost himself up enough to climb onto the lip of the tank.

“Be careful,” Brett says, suddenly nervous. 

“Yeah. You too.” With that, Liam’s gone, lowering himself slowly into the open manhole of the tank. Brett stays where he is; he could scope out the area but if something happens and he’s wandered too far, Liam could get trapped.

He hears some clattering, Liam’s voice echoing in the tank, and wonders if Liam’s talking to himself or whether he expects a response. When there’s no pause in the dialogue, the question pretty much answers itself.

Nothing happens while Liam’s in the tank. Brett stands guard for fifteen minutes before Liam’s head appears in the manhole, and Brett heads back over.

“Find anything?”

“Yeah.” Liam starts passing things down to him. “Nothing happen out here?”

“Nah. Heard you talking to yourself.”

He swears Liam blushes, but it could just be the light. “Bad habit,” is all Liam says as he swings his legs out of the manhole and surveys the jump to the ground.

Brett reaches out wordlessly, offering to help, and Liam bristles. “I’m not a toddler,” he snaps.

“I know,” Brett says easily. “But there’s not much point breaking your ankle if it’s avoidable.”

Liam looks like he’s going to fight it for a second, but then sighs, putting his hands on Brett’s shoulders and trusting Brett to lift him down. “I hate being short,” he mutters. “It didn’t matter before the world was overrun by zombies but it’s pretty fucking inconvenient now."

Brett puts his hands on Liam's waist and lifts him down. "At least you've got me," he says.

"Yeah," Liam says, and he sounds... strange. Not angry, but his tone is definitely off. Brett's about to ask when Liam knees and shoves the loot under the tank. "We'll come back," he says confidently. "There's no point carrying it." 

Brett nods. "Sounds good. Where to now?"

Liam looks at his map. "Uh... there's a few stores round the corner I haven't been to for a while," Liam says. "Weather's been too shitty. Let's go that way." 

Brett follows Liam dutifully. His pace is pretty gruelling for someone who has short legs, and Brett only manages to keep up because he's got longer ones. He knows Liam's routine by now: up early, out early, walk out to the furthest point in his little expedition, then backtrack. It's a smart plan, Brett reflects. 

"So," Brett says. "Where're we going?"

"Convenience store." Liam heads around the corner. "There might be some stuff there we can loot," he murmurs. "If it hasn't been damaged by all the rain."

They go in through the front door, which is a welcome change from having to scale the side of the pharmacy. The store's obviously been looted, but there's still some stuff around - a surprising amount, actually. Liam begins circling around the shelves.

"See if you can find anything," he says. "I'll come back this way eventually."

Brett heads off, looking for any packages of over-the-counter medication that might be lying around, finds a few bottles of Tylenol and aspirin. There's not a lot else - unless he can get into the store room.

He turns another corner, looks behind a tall promotional display - and is suddenly facing a dormant walker. Or, it was dormant - as soon as Brett's near, it opens its mouth, its teeth gnashing furiously, snarling.

"Brett!" Liam yells. "Behind you!" 

He turns and there's another one, right there, sees Liam racing back towards him between the shelves. He raises the crossbow and an arrow pierces the skull of the zombie behind Brett, only a few inches from Brett's own face.

He turns around, meaning to knife the other in the head, but he can't reach the weapons Liam gave him. He looks around, frantic, sees Liam moving out of the corner of his eye, crossbow raised again - and then Liam gives a harsh, startled yelp as he's dragged down to the floor by a hand grabbing his ankle. 

Brett hears the sound of Liam's head hitting the ground, but there's nothing he can do from here - he's struggling against his own zombie, who's all gnashing teeth and wild, undead eyes. He searches frantically for a weapon, finds part of a shelving unit nearby.

He lunges, manages to get his hand around it, and turns just in time to impale the first zombie right through the head. He can hear Liam yelling somewhere to his right, hopes like hell that it's not the yells of someone being violently torn apart by zombies.

He makes quick work of the second zombie and turns around. 

"Fuck," he says. There's a zombie - a fucking huge zombie - lying on top of Liam, who's struggling beneath the weight. 

"Liam," Brett says. He's vaulting over the destroyed rows of old promotional products before he thinks maybe the danger hasn't passed. "Liam, are you-"

Liam's shoving at the body of the zombie with what looks like all his strength; Brett grabs its shirt to haul it off him. It's a pretty overweight zombie, so Brett isn't surprised it takes two of them to move it. When he finally manages to drag it all the way off Liam, the panic hits him; Liam's covered in blood.

"Liam," he breathes. "Are you-"

"I don't think so," Liam says shakily. "I think it's just - I think it's his blood, not mine."

"Let me check," Brett says. "Come on, stand up. You okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine." He sounds pretty shaken up but Brett would too. "I don't think it bit me."

"Stand up," Brett says. "Come on." He reaches down and helps Liam to his feet. Liam stands up, but he looks a little wobbly on his feet. Brett starts turning him around, patting him down, looking for blood or tears in his clothes or obvious bite wounds.

As he spins Liam away from him, he catches sight of blood on Liam's neck, and his stomach drops. For a moment, he can't even hear sound; if Liam's bitten on his neck, that's it. There's nothing he'll be able to do except watch him die. 

But then he sees the blood gushing from the back of Liam's skull and remembers the sound of his head impacting the hard tiled floor of the pharmacy. "Fuck," he says with a wince. "That's gotta hurt." It makes sense that Liam's a little wobbly on his feet now; he must've hit his head pretty hard.

"What?" Liam lifts his hand, touches the back of his head, screws his face up. "Ow."

"Yeah. Ow. It's bleeding a lot." Liam's dark blonde hair is staining bright red with the blood. 

"No bites?" Liam asks hesitantly.

He spins Liam around and checks him everywhere conceivable. There are no marks on him; the blood really does seem to belong to the zombie.

"You're clean," he says to Liam. "You're fine." 

Liam nods, not saying anything. He's still breathing pretty harshly. Brett looks towards the body - it's a fresh one, someone recently turned, judging by the relatively whole skin, which is probably why they had so much trouble taking it down. It has a single wound left by Liam right between the eyes. Brett blinks as he looks closer.

"Liam?"

"Yeah?" Liam asks distractedly. He's picking his knife up.

"Is that a pen?"

Liam looks. There's a four-coloured pen lodged squarely between the eyes of the zombie, only the end sticking out. 

"Yeah," Liam says.

"You killed a two hundred and fifty pound zombie with a fucking ballpoint pen?" Brett asks incredulously. 

"I dropped my knife," Liam says blankly. "It was the first thing I grabbed."

Brett shakes his head. "Every day, I realise how lucky I am you didn't kill me on sight," he says. "A ballpoint pen. Seriously." 

Liam nods at him. He still seems kind of like he's in shock; Brett looks at him and realises Liam's covered in rancid, sludge-like blood, and his stomach turns.

"Come on," he says. "You need to get cleaned up. I'll find you some new clothes." 

"It's getting late," Liam protests.

"We'll be fine. So we'll be back a little later. Doesn't matter. You can't walk around like that. You seriously can't - the smell is gonna make me puke eventually." 

Liam smiles. "Guess it's lucky I've got no sense of smell." 

"You don't? That is pretty lucky. Here I thought you had a stomach made of iron or something." He's going to leave, but Liam stays where he is. "Liam?"

Liam's crouching by the body. "This is really fresh," he murmurs. "I mean - whoever this was, they were bitten really recently. They still have hair an everything."

"So?" Brett asks.

Liam looks disturbed. "So there are people a lot closer to us than I thought," Liam says, "but I didn't notice them enter the city. Either I'm getting rusty or this guy was one of the Keepers."

"The Keepers?" Brett asks.

Liam nods. "They pretty much patrol the entire west side of the city," he says. "Control most of the inbound and outbound tunnels. They're not friendly. But I don't know why one of them would be out this far... or if they're gonna send someone to look for him." 

Brett looks at the guy; Liam's right. He's only recently died, and judging by the fact that his organs aren't hanging out and he seems mostly whole, Brett's willing to bet he got bitten and died out here, slowly, from the fever. "Why didn't he go back?" Brett mumbles. 

"They would've killed him," Liam says. "Or maybe he didn't have time."

Brett reaches down and helps Liam to his feet. "Not much we can do now," he says. "Let's go." 

They head to the stream, and Brett tries not to look as Liam begins stripping out of his bloody clothes. The only thing spared are his Converse - and what the hell, the kid is wearing converse in a zombie apocalypse?

Brett finds a Nordstrom store and manages to break into it pretty quietly. He has to guess Liam's size, but he picks up a pair of jeans, some heavy-duty boots, a long-sleeved grey shirt and a jacket. The warmest one he can find is red and black plaid on the outside, flannel, lined on the inside with shearling. It should keep Liam pretty warm.

When he gets back to the stream of water, Liam's pretty much shivering himself to death, and Brett cusses himself out for not getting a towel. "Where'd you get all that?" he asks, voice shaking, as Brett approaches.

"Broke into Nordstrom." He dumps the stuff and yanks a rag out from his pocket, hands it to Liam. "Dry off and get dressed."

He waits until Liam's done, turns to find him standing in the clothes - which fit him pretty well, really - still kind of shivering faintly. Brett's surprised to see that Liam makes the red and black jacket look good.

"Warm?"

"This is great." Liam tugs at the jacket. "Thanks. Hey, we should go back for you. I mean, I've got a few changes of clothes, but I'm sure you need some. Maybe not today, but tomorrow."

Brett nods. "We circling back now?"

"Think so. Start collecting everything. Don't wanna be caught after dark." Liam boosts himself out of the small ditch. "Let's go." 

Everything seems normal for the first part of the trip back; Liam slides into all the little nooks and crannies he's hid things while Brett covers him, and they're making good time. The sun is still high, right overhead, and Brett thinks maybe they might be able to stop and loot some food if they're smart about it. They don't need it, exactly, but it can't hurt.

He notices, just as they pass the playground, that Liam's not in front of him anymore - which is odd, because even though Brett more or less knows the way back, Liam usually takes point in case they need a quick exit somewhere.

He turns around. "Li?" he asks curiously. 

Liam's wandering along behind him, but his pace is slow and he's not looking at Brett. So Brett circles back to him, puts his hand on Liam's shoulder. "Hey," he says. "What's up?

"Nothin'," Liam says unconvincingly. 

Brett takes in his posture slowly. "Are you hurt?" he asks hesitantly. He doesn't want to badger Liam, but that's the only thing he can think of that would cause Liam to walk this slowly, given his normal pace. He checked Liam over, but that was for bites. If something else happened...

Liam's rubbing his eyes now, his head, pinching the bridge of his nose. "My head hurts," he complains. He seems kind of dazed, and now that Brett's looking, he's also not walking in a straight line.

"Liam," he says. "Slow down. I think you might have a-"

Liam leans over, then, and throws up, barely missing his own shoes. Brett drags him around the puddle before he can step in it, nose wrinkled.

"Concussion," he finishes quietly. And damn, having a concussion in the middle of the zombie apocalypse is not good news at all. "Sit down," he murmurs, guiding Liam to a bench.

Liam resists. "No," he says.

"Liam, you're hurt," Brett snaps. "You need-"

"To get back." Liam sounds confused, but determined. "The sun's setting. We need to get back. There's nowhere safe for us to stay out here. It's only another mile," he adds quietly. "I'll make it at least that far."

Brett knows it's pointless to argue. "Fine," he says. "But we're redistributing the weight in the packs. You can still carry stuff," he says before Liam can interrupt him. "I just don't want you to carry anything heavy." 

Liam nods. "Fine."

The walk back is mostly quiet; Liam's making a pretty consistent effort to match Brett's pace, but he's moving pretty slowly still. Brett stays by his side, letting Liam bump into him like a bowling ball against the guard rails.

They're probably only a quarter of a mile away when Brett stops and says, "Okay, give me your pack. It's not far." 

Liam doesn't argue with him; he passes the pack off and manages to pick up his pace a bit. He hasn't complained, even once, about being in pain; Brett knows he picked up some pain pills at the pharmacy so he'll give Liam one, maybe two, just to help him rest for the night. 

They eventually get back to the townhouse. Liam struggles up the stairs, and Brett thinks for a moment that Liam's injured elsewhere until he sees Liam's face and realises he's just disoriented and unsteady. Brett hurries up the steps, dumps the packs, and goes back for Liam.

Liam looks up as Brett reaches him. "I'm fine," he protests. "Seriously."

"You can't even get up the steps. Let me help, okay?"

He drags Liam's arm over his shoulder and wraps his own around Liam's waist. Yeah, Liam's definitely wonky on his feet, barely even seems to know where they are in relation to the rest of him, but with Brett guiding him, he manages to the stairs.

"You okay?" Brett asks.

"Uh huh." But there's a distinct whine in Liam's voice. "Don't suppose we have any hard-core painkillers, right?"

"I've got Tylenol," Brett says.

"That'll do." 

Once they're inside, Brett helps Liam out of his jacket and helps him sit down. He gets the fire lit before anything, to provide light, and then moves so he can see the back of Liam's head.

He winces when he sees the gash in the back, which is crusted over with blood. The hair around the area is matted, and Liam flinches when Brett tries to part it to see the wound. Would this normally need stitches? Probably. He's not even gonna try.

"Fuck me," he says quietly.

"Time and place," Liam shoots back weakly.

Brett can't help but chuckle. "Uh huh. How's your head?"

Liam's rubbing at his nose again, irritably, and Brett nods. "Feels kinda like being on a plane, huh?" he asks. "Like there's pressure in your skull."

"Yeah." Liam quits rubbing his face, though, like he knows it won't help. "Is this gonna be something that keeps me down for a while?" he asks. "I've got shit to do."

"I dunno," Brett murmurs. He's lifting Liam's head gently, by his chin, flashing the torch in his eyes. Liam flinches, but his pupils dilate evenly. "You hit your head pretty hard, but you seem okay... how're you feeling?"

"Still kinda sick." 

Brett nods, drags the bucket near the fireplace closer. "Here. Just in case. Anything else?"

"Dizzy. Feel kind of sleepy." 

Brett nods again. "Why don't you sleep?" he asks. "I'll wake you up every three hours, make sure you're doing okay."

The first hour passes uneventfully; Liam sleeps deeply, barely stirring. The second hour, he wakes up and pukes again, twice, and Brett starts to feel a little uneasy. He knows that any vomiting after a head injury is bad, and he was always told by his coach that you should call a doctor or go to the ER when it happened, but there's nothing he can do. There's nowhere to take Liam, even if he is bleeding in his brain.

So he wakes Liam up every three hours on the dot, makes him answer questions until Liam's snapping at him, telling him to fuck off and let him rest, and that's how Brett knows he's fine. By the time the sun comes up the next day, he's curled up on the bed with his arm thrown over Liam's waist, drowsy and watching him sleep.

_He's gonna hate this_ , Brett thinks sleepily. _He's gonna wake up and stab me to death for the indignity_.

When Liam does eventually wake up, it's a slow process, and Brett almost wishes he'd stayed asleep - because the moment Liam's awake enough to have a coherent thought, he's pressing his hands against his eyes and saying, "Oh God, my head hurts," and rolling sluggishly onto his side, away from Brett and the window. He doesn't even seem to notice Brett's arm over his waist.

"You okay?" Brett asks, keeping his voice pitched low. 

"Light hurts," Liam mumbles.

Brett sighs, looks outside. "Well," he says. "You aren't going far... not like this. Guess today we're staying inside."

"Oh fun," Liam mutters. "A whole day stuck inside with a jackhammer drilling at my skull. This is gonna be great."


	5. Chapter Five - Two Minutes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you guys so much for all the lovely comments! I promise I'm working on getting back to them ^_^ This is a little bit of filler, but after that, things start warming up again! Thanks for reading :)

**Chapter Five - Two Minutes**  
Liam's P.O.V  
"We should use some of the stuff at the hospital to make sure you're okay."

Liam reigns in his rising irritation by the skin of his teeth. "There's no power," he points out. "The backup generators crapped themselves a long time ago. And we don't know how to use the equipment anyway." He rolls his shoulders. 

Brett flashes his torch in Liam's eyes. "Your pupils are dilating evenly," he murmurs.

Liam doesn't know what the fuck that's supposed to mean, so he lets it go. Brett's voice is booming around in his head like an endless, painful echo, and he just wants Brett to stop talking so he can cradle his head in his hands and try not to throw up. 

"You could be bleeding in your brain," Brett says.

"Yeah. So? We wouldn't know how to use the machines and there's no power anyway. Besides, the hospitals are usually filled with zombies. They were the first places to get hit." Liam rubs his face. "We're just gonna have to wait it out."

"Liam, your head-"

"There's nothing you can do," Liam reiterates tiredly. "If I'm gonna die from a concussion then I'm gonna die. My head doesn't feel worse and I'm not puking anymore." Not that he won't. He feels like if Brett left him alone for long enough he'd probably lean over and puke right where he's sitting, but he's trying to keep his breakfast down. 

Brett's hand lands on the back of his neck, starts massaging the tendons there, and Liam tries to let some of the tension bleed slowly out of him. Nobody's touched him in a really long time and he'd forgotten what it felt like.

"You said your head doesn't feel worse," Brett says softly, "but does it feel any better?"

"No," Liam mumbles.

"We have aspirin," Brett remembers. "You want some?"

"No aspirin," Liam says. "If I am bleeding on my brain and you give me aspirin it'll make it worse. Aspirin thins your blood out."

"How do you know all this stuff?" Brett asks. "About the drugs and injuries and stuff like that. Were you insanely smart or something? You said you didn't go to college."

"I didn't." Liam blinks, feeling irritated. "Dude, I'm seventeen." 

There's a long pause. Brett gets up, finds some water, and brings it back to Liam, tries to get him to drink. "You need to keep hydrated," he murmurs. "I know you feel shitty but water will help." 

Liam ignores the wrenching expression on Brett's face - like he's really worried about Liam and just wants to coddle him or something - and drinks reluctantly. His stomach turns even with the water in it, and he closes his eyes, swallowing.

"You look kinda green," Brett says. "You alright?" 

Liam nods. He's just trying really, really fucking hard not to projectile vomit on Brett. And he knows he has to keep water down. Dehydration after a head injury is the last thing he needs right now - the last thing Brett needs.

He doesn't open his eyes, but he does grip the bucket Brett puts in his hands. "Try not to," Brett says, "but it's there if you need it, okay?" 

Liam nods jerkily. He sits there for about ten minutes, fighting for every second he doesn't vomit, but eventually, his stomach begrudgingly accepts that the water is there to stay and settles down. He swallows and lifts his head.

Brett's concerned face is the first thing he sees. "You okay?"

"Didn't puke," Liam says. "That's a win."

Brett smiles. "Yeah. Good job." He even sounds like he means it, which is almost cloyingly sweet. Liam puts the bucket aside, chews on his lip for a bit, ignores the painful throbbing of his head.

"My stepdad," Liam says softly.

"Huh?"

"I know because my stepdad told me." Liam lifts his head briefly to look at Brett, then ducks it again. "He was a doctor."

"You said the hospitals got hit the hardest," Brett says slowly. "What happened?"

Liam frowns at him. "You don't know?"

Brett shakes his head. "I was camping when the outbreak hit," he says. "You know, people were getting sick before we went, but when we got back, that's when we knew something was really wrong, because they weren't even trying to evacuate. But I never found out how it happened."

Liam begins to get to his feet. He wobbles unsteadily once he's on them - he really didn't realise how hard he'd hit his head until he started feeling the full effects of the concussion today. Brett steadies him worriedly.

"Where're you going?"

"Follow me," Liam mumbles, starting down the hallway.

"Liam-"

"I'm just going to the spare room," Liam snaps. "Don't worry." He feels instantly bad for snapping - Brett got that walker off him, made sure he got home okay, nursed him all last night, made sure to wake him up every three hours. "Sorry," he sighs.

"That's okay," Brett says easily. "What're you showing me?" 

Liam opens the door and motions Brett through. The room is filled with newspaper clippings, taped to the walls, stacks of books in the corners of the room, magazines, everything conceivable. Brett looks around. 

He probably thinks I'm nuts, Liam thinks gloomily, sitting down with a sigh of relief. The world stops spinning once he's stationary. 

"I was trying to figure out where it came from," he admits. "How it hit so fast. I know it's dumb. Even if I figured it out, it's like, my highest education is freshman year of high school. What would I do about it, right? But there was nothing else to do." He gestures. "This is everything I've found." 

Brett sits beside Liam, staring at the wall of headlines. "So what happened?" he asks. 

"I don't know," Liam says despondently. And that's what really gets him. He doesn't know what happened, how it hit so fast, where it came from - why the bite triggers the transformation into a zombie without fail every time. Why is it always the bite, but never anything else? Why don't people who die of regular causes come back?

Brett nudges him, and Liam startles. Brett's sitting really close to him, and Liam gets suddenly caught up in just how blue Brett's eyes are - which is just dumb, so dumb, because it's not like he's never seen blue eyes before. But he's never seen any quite like Brett's.

"What do you think happened?" Brett asks softly.

Liam looks back at the wall of clippings in front of him. He knows what he thinks happened. But he thinks it's a dumb theory and that he probably sounds like a fucking crazy person when he talks about it. Not that he ever really has, but Garrett thought he was whack, that's for sure.

"It started in South Korea," he says softly. "A new disease with flu-like symptoms. Which meant, right from the offset, that it was really underreported. People don't call their country's disease control centres for flu symptoms. Anyway, it appeared first in a population of South Korean school kids. And at first, you know, no one thinks anything of it. Because they're kids, right? They get sick. Happens all the time. And they're all in close proximity. No big deal."

"No big deal," Brett agrees.

Liam rolls his shoulders with discomfort; his head's really throbbing now. "Nobody thought anything of it, really, at first," he continues. "That was until it spread like wildfire to the kids' families and everyone was dead within days. This is the interesting part, sort of - the first few hundred thousand people infected did reanimate, without being bitten, within hours of dying. And for some reason, that doesn't happen anymore."

"It mutated?" Brett asks.

"Yeah. Like that swine flu shit we had a few years ago." Liam points at an article. "The bodies were released to the families, and that's when the munching started. Now, if it'd happened anywhere else in the world - here, or England, or maybe even Australia, that would've been the end of it. They would've just, you know, sterilised everything and been done with it. Had their own people take care of the mess."

"So what happened?" Brett asks. "How the fuck did it get out of South Korea?"

"The healthcare system couldn't deal with the burden of it," Liam says. "So they asked China for help, but China refused. So the South Koreans basically went, well, fuck you, China-" Brett laughs here, even though Liam wasn't trying to be funny - "And turned to the good old land of the free for help."

"And we helped them?"

"Yup. Guess what we did? Put them on planes and flew them over here. Guess how long that plane trip is?"

"How long?"

"Fourteen hours," Liam sighs. "Give or take some spare change. Enough for a fucking plane full of infected to die, reanimate, and kill everyone else on the plane. Plane lands, military sends in people to check it out. At this point nobody had any idea what was actually causing the infection, so when people got bitten, it wasn't really considered dangerous."

"Shit," Brett says, stunned. "So-"

"So," Liam says, "the response team gets cleaned up, sent home with everyday antibiotics and told to rest. Because they aren't showing any sign of infection, are they? So you've got a population of about three hundred airport response staff who have been exposed in some way, shape or form, who are asymptomatic, who get sent home. Not quarantined, for whatever reason. One to three days later, the fever kills them, they reanimate, and start munching on their families. By the time the CDC worked out that it was the bite, and that carriers could remain asymptomatic for up to twenty four hours after infection, it was way too late."

"Okay," Brett says. "I get all that. But how come they didn't stop it after that?" 

"That's where shit really hits the fan," Liam says. "It was fucking Wikileaks, man. That nosy prick journalist finds out that a couple of scientists holed up underground in where-the-fuck-ever have discovered that everyone's infected with this virus, and he leaks the info to the press. Well, guess what people do when they know they're sick? They go to hospitals. Hospitals which are filled with the dying or dead. And..." Liam gestures vaguely. 

"Wow," Brett says softly.

"There you have it. Long story short - there used to be at least two strains of this virus. The one that infected you and killed you, then reanimated you without the bite. Now, the one that's transmitted by the bite only. We've all got some strain of it. It's airborne. The bite just gives you a fever you can't shake and it kills you, eventually. It's not survivable. The group I used to be with tried amputating someone's arm when they got bitten, but he turned anyway."

Liam blinks. He's been trying not to think about that; about Garrett, flesh ripped clean from his arm, bleeding everywhere. Amputating his arm two minutes later. Not soon enough. Two minutes. How many seconds less would it have taken for the amputation to work? If Liam had just been a little faster with it - called someone faster, or just done it himself - would Garrett still be alive?

"I've seen amputation work," Brett says. "But it has to be fast." 

"My stepdad said they don't know how it crossed the species barrier," Liam murmurs. He tries to shake himself out of memories of Garrett; they're still too painful to revisit right now. "Or what species it came from originally. Without that they don't have anything to work with." 

"Your stepdad," Brett realises. "The hospitals-"

"I was there," Liam says. "I had some dumb injury because I'd gotten into a fight at school that day. Marshal law wasn't working." Liam swallows. "Army busted into the hospital," he continues shakily. "Shot everyone in sight, bitten or not. Just shot them. Kids in their beds, elderly people, doctors, nurses, it didn't matter."

"How'd you get out?" Brett asks.

"My stepdad got me out," Liam says. "Fire escape. He told me to find Mom but I was freaking out and there were zombies and soldiers everywhere. I just panicked. I ran into some people who took me in. I survived with them for a while, but when they decided to move on... they just didn't plan it well. A lot of people died. Me and some friends from school, we heard this city was safe. So we headed here, but I think only I made it. Me and Garrett, and a few others, got separated from the others. I don't know what happened to them."

"What happened to Garrett?"

Liam closes his eyes. He's been trying not to think about that. Trying not to think about the way Garrett screamed bloody and high-pitched and raw when that fucking walker got him; trying not to think about the look of resignation already on his face as one of the guys they were with slammed him down on the ground in the aftermath, two minutes later.

_"Hold still!"_

"Liam?"

Liam looks up at Brett; Brett looks really worried, kind of shocked. "You're crying," he says.

"What do you think fucking happened to Garrett?" Liam snaps bitterly. "Same thing that happened to everyone else. He got bit. I put him down myself." 

"You - you..."

"I put him down. By that point nobody else was alive." Liam blinks the tears away. "He was meant to do it himself," he says bitterly. "But he didn't. He left that particular job for me to finish." He's starting to feel sick again; he stands up. "I'm gonna go lie down," he mumbles.

He makes his way back to his bed; Brett's not following him. He curls up, drags the blanket up, and tries desperately not to cry. Yeah, he's fucking mad at Garrett for not doing it himself, for forcing Liam to do it. But he also misses him like crazy and wishes he was here, most of the time. And Brett isn't Garrett, not even close. Sometimes Liam wishes he was.

He hears Brett enter, feels the bed dip. Then Brett's hand is on his shoulder, his thumb stroking soothingly.

"I'm really sorry about Garrett," Brett says softly. "And that you had to deal with it. I'm sorry." 

After that, Brett leaves him alone. And after a little while, Liam feels okay enough to crawl at least to the edge of the bed and watch as Brett begins whittling away at a piece of wood meant for the fire.

"I don't expect anyone to show up," he says quietly.

Brett jumps, looks up at him. "Huh?"

"I know you think I'm nuts," Liam says. "For waiting around here for my friends. But the truth is that I don't expect anyone to show up and I haven't for about six months now."

"So why are you still here?" Brett asks gently.

"I don't know where else to go," Liam admits. "Or what to do. I'd probably die out there on my own, you know. I know you think I'm some sort of badass prodigy but I'm not. I just know the lay of the land here. I'm not brave enough to go anywhere else, even if it means finding people."

Brett straightens up a little, looks at Liam appraisingly. "You know," he says quietly, "my offer still stands. Come with me if you want. If you trust me enough to travel with me, that is."

And God, Liam almost wants to. Wants to leave this place and all its hollow, lonely memories, but he really doesn't know if he can. Because he's lonely, but he's also afraid of what people will do to survive now. And he knows, deep down in his bones, that his age is a disadvantage; that people will take advantage of him and use him and treat him like he's stupid because he's young. He knows that most men around, now, will look at him and see prey. 

It's not fair to put that on Brett. Brett, who looks every bit a man, who would have to constantly be watching out for him. That isn't fair. To expect him to do that.

"I trust you," Liam says eventually, tonelessly. "If I didn't you wouldn't be here." And then, because he's selfish, because he wants the option to be open even if he doesn't end up taking it - "I'll think about it." 

There's no life here for him now. And maybe Liam's finally grown up enough to realise that life is more than just surviving, and that this? This tiny existence, marked only by the rising and falling of the sun, isn't living.

"How did you know?" Brett asks Liam softly.

"Know what?"

"That no rescue was coming."

Liam sighs. "I guess it was when I saw this military guy, you know, big, burly colonel, ditch his post. He told his soldiers to go home to their families. That's how I knew." He looks over at Brett. "You?"

Brett shakes his head. "No particular moment," he says. "I guess I just did. I knew, you know, because once we got back to society - we'd been camping, totally out of range - everything had already gone to shit, and they weren't even trying to evacuate anyone." 

"Should've stayed camping," Liam says softly. "Would've been safer."

"We went back for a while," Brett says. "But we didn't really know how to survive. I mean, one guy, he just drowned one night, you know? Had way too much to drink when he found out his girlfriend had been bitten and turned, wandered out into the lake, and drowned. We found him a few days later."

"I'm sorry about your friend," Liam says.

Brett smiles. "It's okay. We've all lost someone, right?"

Liam nods, chastising himself for being a brat about it earlier. Yeah. They have all lost people. He's not the only one.

"Listen, um," Liam says. He feels like he should somehow try to indicate that he appreciates how nice Brett is to him - because Liam's a prick most of the time and he does actually possess the self-awareness to know that - and so he tries out something along the lines of being caring. "I um, I haven't been able to find you a way out of the city," he says. "I've been searching for days and just, nothing's turned up, you know? I'm sorry. The tunnels and exits are all filled with zombies or controlled by Keepers or caved in. And I - uh, I'm really worried about the cold."

"The cold?" Brett asks.

"It snows here," Liam says. "Like a lot, and the lakes freeze, and it's just kind of horrible. If you went out there now, you'd end up getting caught in the middle of winter. Which I'm, um, you don't wanna - you know. Travel. In the snow."

What he meant to say was "I'm worried about the cold and don't want you to get sick or die from exposure or starvation" but it doesn't quite come out that way, though he thinks Brett might've known what he meant, because he's wearing a wide smile.

"You worried about me, Liam?"

"No," Liam grumbles. _Yes_. "You're an adult; you can take care of yourself."

"Evidently not," Brett says dryly. "In the first half hour I met you I'd been chased by zombies, got knocked out - by you, I might add - and was dying of starvation until you took pity on me and fed me." 

"Well," Liam mumbles, "I couldn't, you know, leave you there. I'm not that much of an asshole."

"You aren't an asshole," Brett says. "You're just highly strung."

"Highly string this," Liam grumbles, raising his middle finger.

When Brett laughs, Liam thinks he might even be okay with leaving.


	6. Chapter Six - Defrosting

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guess who's back, back, back, back again. This is a bit longer than the rest! Also worth noting is that I watched Daybreakers yesterday and now I want to write a fucking vampire AU. Of Teen WOLF. Yeah. Thanks for reading and commenting! :D

**Chapter Six - Defrosting**

Winter's in full force.

It's been six weeks since Liam hit his head, and Brett's still in the city with him. Which means he's known Liam for seven weeks and a few days.

And - he can't believe he's saying this - but Liam's actually a little less abrasive. In fact, Brett's beginning to think that the aggression and irritability might be to cover up for the fact that Liam's actually kind of shy. 

Not cripplingly so - he's just as willing to snark to Brett as he is to feed him, but Brett doesn't mind much. There's hardly ever genuine heat behind Liam's deadpan muttering, and honestly, it's just nice to have someone to talk to. But Brett's definitely noticed that Liam's prone to blushing - especially when Brett does things like point out how efficient Liam is at something - and also prone to stuttering when he's flustered.

Brett tries not to think it's cute. But it is, somehow. When they're out scavenging and killing zombies and working their way through the area, or when Liam comes home dragging a deer, it's easy to forget that he's seventeen. Then, Brett will say something innocuous like "I miss porn" and Liam will blush and stammer and generally not know what to say. That's when Brett remembers.

They get along well, though. And Brett hasn't said it aloud, because he's not quite ready for Liam to scoff at him, but he thinks they make a good team. Liam's lighter than him, smaller, can squeeze into tighter places to look for things, but Brett's height and size is an advantage in a fight against zombies.

The apartment isn't big. They've finally resorted to using the shower - Liam says it's too noisy to run most of the time, but they have to keep clean, their little pond has frozen solid with the weather. The fire barely keeps the cold at bay. But there's a little space for Brett in Liam's life, and Liam's even making it bigger for him, slowly, now that Brett's around for at least the duration of the winter. 

Brett watches as Liam jumps one of the leftover barricades, slinks forward almost soundlessly. They're out hunting - Liam's decided Brett needs to know how, even though the only game around right now is small. 

Brett's still having trouble keeping up. Liam's fast on his feet and knows where he's going; Brett is neither of those things. Although he doesn't seem to feel the cold as acutely as Liam does - he's from Minnesota so that could be expected.

He doesn't know where Liam's from. Actually, the things he knows about Liam are startlingly small. He's seventeen years old, has dark blonde hair and blue eyes, had a stepfather who was a doctor and a mother. He had a friend named Garrett. He doesn't shave his face yet. He's a morning person. He prefers deer meat over anything else. He hates breaking from routine. 

Deeper than that, though, Brett is pretty sure Liam's intensely loyal and steadfast. He doesn't really have proof, yet, because Liam still keeps him at arms' length - they talk, and sometimes Liam even laughs, or jokes around with Brett - but he's yet to see that loyalty come out. He's sure he will sometime. 

Brett slows down a little when he sees Liam stop, lower his crossbow, and put an arm over his mouth. He's coughing. Brett feels a thrill of anxiety at that; the cough showed up two days ago and while Liam seems fine, other than that, Brett knows this kind of stuff can escalate quickly. He's seen it happen, after all.

"You okay?" he asks softly, walking to Liam's side.

Liam nods, drags in a breath. "Yeah," he pants. "I'm okay."

"Sounds pretty nasty." Brett watches Liam as he straightens up properly and adjusts his grip on his crossbow. 

"It's no big deal." Liam barely restrains another cough. "It's just a cough. It'll go away on its own."

Brett listens intently. Liam's breathing doesn't sound wheezy or laboured, and he's been eating okay, but it doesn't mean he won't get worse.

"Okay," Brett says quietly. "But hey. If we come across a chemist, how about we loot some cough medicine? It can't be a bad thing to have around." 

Liam nods. "Alright."

Brett listens carefully to Liam's coughing as they continue, trying to work out if it's similar to the coughing his friends had last year when that flu was going around, or whether it's just a dry cough caused by the weather. He hopes it's the latter. 

Liam turns to him. "Wanna see something cool?" he asks.

"Cool meaning...?"

Liam smiles. "Cool." With that, he sets off in a different direction, and Brett follows - partly because he wants to know what this cool thing is, and partly because he's fucking lost and can't get home from here. 

Liam's not moving quite as fast as he was before, like he's relaxed, which means Brett has an easier time keeping up with him. He trudges along after Liam - it's not like Liam's easy to lose with his bright red and black plaid jacket, after all. 

Liam strides into a building and begins up the stairs. Brett follows, praying by the fifteenth floor that it all ends soon. Liam's panting too, at least. He doesn't feel as bad.  
Finally, Liam pushes open a door on the top floor of the building and strides across the rooftop to the edge, where he sits down. Brett looks around warily, but there's no signs of the biters up here. He guesses Liam already cleared them out.

He goes to the edge with Liam and sits down. "Okay," he says. "What am I looking at?"

Liam points.

Brett looks out across the landscape, and the breath in his lungs freezes. From here, he can see the lake, like a huge, flat, glittering crystal, reflecting the light from the sun off the nearby buildings and turning almost the whole setting into a sea of mirrors.

"Wow," Brett breathes.

"It's pretty awesome," Liam says. "I come up here a lot." He's taken a package of crackers out of his pack and offers them to Brett. Brett takes one, thinking about the significance of this - not only does Liam think the scenery is worth deviating from their usual routine for, it's also taken him nearly eight weeks to show Brett. So this place must mean something to him. 

"When did you find it?"

"Early on," Liam says around a mouthful of crackers. "First month or so. You can't hear the zombies from up here. I used to come up here just to get away from it all."   
Brett closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. Liam's right; up here, it's silent save for the sound of the wind whipping through the buildings and trees - and Liam's soft, easy breathing next to him.

Brett turns to look at him. Liam's hair is lit up like spun gold in the sunlight, his pupils pinpricks. His cheeks are flushed with the cold. He seems to notice Brett watching him, because he turns around, giving a soft, shy smile. 

"What?"

"Nothing. I just don't think I've ever seen you in proper lighting. Not when you've been sitting still, anyway." 

Liam shrugs. "I'm nothing special," he says. "Look at the view, man."

Brett realises, with Liam's words, that he does actually think Liam's special, somehow. And it's not even like he knows Liam that well, so he's not sure where that feeling is coming from. But he's looking at Liam, and they're sitting hundreds of feet above the ground, and right now, he can pretend that they're just a couple of friends on a roof, hanging out. 

_If this were before_ , he thinks, _I would've made a move on him by now._

But he doesn't, now, even though Liam looks like he might not exactly be unwilling. Because Liam's pretty much his lifeline, and he can't compromise that for anything. Besides which, he's not sure if he actually likes Liam, or whether he's just romanticising the guy due to him being the only person Brett's seen in months.

"Liam," he says. "Listen, um-"

But Liam's looking out across the lake, sitting up and straight and putting the crackers down. "Can you see that?"

Brett tears his gaze from Liam's smooth, pale skin and looks across the lake. He's wondering what Liam's talking about until he sees it - the shape of a person, on the ice, unmoving, with what looks like a bag of supplies next to him.

"Is he okay?" Liam demands.

"He's not moving," Brett says cautiously.

"We need to check it out," Liam says, standing up and grabbing his things. "Come on." 

Brett doesn't have any time to protest, because Liam's already jogging towards the stairwell. Brett follows his trail down the stairs, out the door, and round the corner, which has the clearest path to the lake. 

When they get there, Brett just manages to grab Liam's arm and yank him backwards, away from the edge of the ice. 

"What the hell are you-"

"It might break," Brett tells Liam. "Seriously, you can't-"

"We can't leave him there if he's alive," Liam says, clearly getting angry. "What, so it's only okay for me to stick my neck out when it's you?"

"That's not what I'm saying," Brett snaps. "I'm saying if you fall into the water in these temperatures you could die."

Liam looks at him pleadingly. "The ice is thick," he says desperately. "The lake's been frozen for almost a month now-"

"The further out you go, the less thick the ice will be!" Brett warns heatedly. 

Liam stares up at him.

Brett stands back, rocks on his feet. "Okay," he says shakily. "Whatever, fine. But you think that ice is gonna crack, get the fuck out of there, okay? Don't do anything stupid."

Liam nods, drops his pack and strips off his jacket, begins edging out across the ice. Brett listens, straining his ears to pick up any groaning that might be happening beneath the surface, but can't hear anything. 

He looks around. They're not far from the apartment, now, not even three hundred yards. He's mapping out the route home when he hears Liam call, "Hey. You okay?" 

Brett adjusts his own pack and takes a few hesitant steps out. He wants to be as close as possible to Liam in the event that something goes horrifically wrong. 

Just as he's beginning to freak, Liam turns back to him slowly. "His bag has ammo in it," he says shakily.

"I don't give a fuck," Brett says. "If he's dead get back here."

"I can't tell." Liam's edging closer. "Hey. Hey, man. Are you-"

The ice splinters under Liam's feet, cracks, and gives way with very little warning, sending Liam plunging into the water. Brett yells, resists the urge to run forward - if the ice broke with Liam on it there's no way it'll take his weight - and calls, "Liam?" in a voice he hardly recognises as his.

It's almost a full minute before Liam emerges from the water, panicking and hyperventilating - a response to the cold, Brett knows that, Brett grew up in Minnesota - and splashing as he tries to find something to hang onto.

"Liam," Brett calls. "Liam, you okay?" 

Liam only seems to hear the end of his sentence, and he calls back, "I don't know how-" and Brett realises of course Liam doesn't know how to get out of a hole in the middle of a lake. Of fucking course he doesn't. 

Brett's panicking; he's got five minutes, tops, before Liam isn't going to be strong enough to haul himself out of the water. Ten minutes, minimum, for Liam to go into hypothermic shock and begin to lose functioning of his muscles and limbs. 

"Liam," he calls, trying to keep the panic out of his voice. "Listen to me, yeah?"

He can't hear Liam reply but he sees him nod.

"You need to slow your breathing down," Brett says shakily, taking his pack off carefully and kneeling down. "Slow it down, keep your head up. Hold onto the edge of the hole. The one closest to me. That's it." He's rifling through his pack, desperately looking for something Liam might be able to tie around himself. "That's it, Li," he calls. "Good job."

He finds a length of rope in his pack and thanks Liam silently for being crazy prepared for pretty much anything. "I'm gonna throw you this rope, okay?" he calls, tying it into a lasso shape. "Put it round your chest, under your arms, okay? I'm gonna get you out." 

Liam nods again. Brett tosses him the end of the rope, watching with his heart in his throat as Liam clumsily works himself into the loop and manages to tighten it.

"Okay," Brett says shakily. "Okay, look. You need to get up onto the ice, okay? I can't pull you out from the water. I need you to put your elbows on the ice and start lifting yourself out. If you can't do it I'll try to come out and get you, okay? I'm not gonna leave you."

"Okay." Liam's voice is shaking; he starts pulling himself out of the ice. It takes almost a full minute for him to get onto it, and Brett's losing his shit - Liam's lips are almost the same shade of blue as his eyes and he's soaked right through.

"Don't get up," Brett calls. "Stay right there." He starts pulling the rope, grimacing at the amount of effort it's taking to drag Liam's body across the ice. He hurries, though - he knows every second Liam is lying on the ice, in soaked clothing, will contribute to hypothermic shock and he knows he needs to get Liam out of here and back to the apartment to warm him up. 

How far are they from the apartments? Barely three hundred yards, he's guessing - he's not going to risk stripping Liam's clothes off here, where there's no shelter from the wind. He'll get him back first, strip him down, get him warm. It could take a few hours to get his core temperature back to normal so Brett knows he has to act fast. 

He succeeds in pulling Liam to him and reaches down to help Liam stagger upright. "Come on," he says, pulling Liam along by his jacket. Liam's still hyperventilating, freezing to the touch, and he's clumsy and staggering as he tries to keep up. He's already losing muscle control. 

"Okay," Brett says. "You know what, we aren't far. I'm gonna carry you, okay? Just hold onto me."

He hefts Liam up into his arms and sets off, trying not to think about the damage this is likely doing to his back. Liam's trembling violently - which Brett knows logically is a good thing, but still freaks him out - and breathing hard.

"How're you doing?" Brett pants. "You okay?"

"I'm really cold," Liam slurs. 

"Yeah, no shit," Brett huffs. "I want you to keep talking to me, okay? Just keep talking."

"Why?"

 

"So I know you aren't dying."  
"How'd you know all that?" Liam croaks. "About the ice?"

"I grew up in Minnesota," Brett says. "Everyone was pretty much taught how to escape ice if it came to it. Where'd you grow up?"

"California," Liam mumbles.

"Hey! Stay with me, okay? We're almost back." 

"I'm tired," Liam says.

"Yeah, you're going into hypothermic shock. But you'll be fine. Gonna get you back, roast you in front of the fire and wrap you up like a little angry burrito and you'll be right."  
Liam laughs, but then he starts to cough and Brett really, really hopes that this doesn't make him sicker. Except it probably will, and he needs to use the remaining daylight to get Liam warm and get himself to a chemist - medicine is what Liam's gonna need.

He gets them inside and sits Liam in front of the fire, begins pulling at his clothes. "Come on, Liam," he says. "Get undressed." He uses a match to light the fire - they use them sparingly but this is kind of an emergency - and feeds it until the flame is steady. "Come on," he pushes, seeing that Liam's struggling. "All of it. I'll help."

He gets Liam's jacket and shirt off, then his jeans and shoes and, not stopping to think about the weirdness that's stripping a seventeen year old naked, his boxers as well. He grabs a blanket off the bed and swaddles Liam into it, mostly to get him warm but also to try and preserve his dignity.

Liam hasn't managed to stop shivering, though, and even after Brett wraps him in another blanket Liam's shaking and has his head down, fingers curled weakly around the edges of the blankets. "So," he rasps, "when am I gonna feel warmer?"

"I don't know," Brett says helplessly. "Here." He moves closer and wraps his arms around Liam, pulling him in close and trying to share his body heat.

They sit in silence for a while. Liam shudders against him, and Brett's heart sinks when Liam coughs again. He needs to get out there and find some medicine - anything he can get his hands on, but preferably antibiotics and fever reducers. He's not exactly one hundred percent sure Liam's going to get sick, but it sounds like he's well on the way, and Brett would rather be prepared when that happens.

But first things first - he needs to get Liam warm. Nothing he does will mean anything if Liam dies from hypothermic shock. 

He slips his hands under the duvet around Liam, and Liam pretty much squawks, "what the fuck are you doing?" as Brett begins rubbing his hands vigorously up and down Liam's freezing skin. 

"I'm trying to warm you up," Brett says. 

"Uh huh," Liam mumbles, teeth chattering. "At least buy me dinner first."

"Fine," Brett says. "If that's what I have to do to get you to put out, fine. What'll it be? Deer? Racoon? Possum? Oh, how about squirrel? They're not bad once you get rid of the tail."

Liam laughs hoarsely. "I kind of like deer."

"Yeah?" Brett keeps rubbing Liam's sides frantically; he needs some way to get this kid warmer, but he isn't sure how. 

"Liam," he says desperately, "I need to get you warmer. Okay? So don't freak out with what I'm about to do."

"Oh God, you're gonna strip and join me, aren't you?" Liam croaks miserably.

"Here." Brett passes Liam a pair of boxers. "I've got an idea, okay? Trust me."

Liam pulls them on, slowly, because his fingers are still rigid with the cold. Brett strips his shirt off and sits down facing the fire. "Alright, come here."

"And do what?" Liam croaks.

"Sit on my lap."

"No way."

"Liam, you need to get warm." 

He waits for Liam to protest again, but he doesn't - he shuffles a few feet over and manages to sit with his legs on either side of Brett's hips, leans his head up against Brett's shoulder, and continues to shiver helplessly. 

"God, I can't stop shaking," he moans. "I'm sorry."

Brett tucks Liam in closer to him. "It's fine," he says gently. "It's good you're shaking. It means your core can still tell you're cold. If you stopped now I'd be worried." 

Liam nestles in closer to him, until they're pressed chest-to-chest. "How long do we sit like this?"

"As long as we have to."

They make small talk for a while, but Liam still doesn't really trust Brett and keeps him at arms' length, metaphorically speaking, shying away from most personal questions. After awhile, his responses begin to taper off.

Brett sits in silence for a moment, then says, "So, California, huh?"

He waits, but Liam doesn't answer. When he sneaks a peek down at Liam's face, he's surprised to see that his eyes are closed and he's slumped against Brett's shoulder, his arms wrapped loosely around Brett's waist, totally relaxed and very obviously asleep.

_He fell asleep on me_ , Brett thinks, stunned. _Literally on me. Like a puppy._

He banishes that train of thought - Liam's about as far away from being a puppy as is possible - but he does pull the blankets closer to Liam's freezing skin and bundle him up tighter, wraps Liam in his arms and squeezes softly. The effort is rewarded with Liam snuggling into his chest, breathing a sigh of content.

Brett's heart lurches, then clenches, as he holds Liam tighter. This hot-headed, prickly, defensive little dork is the only person Brett has in the world at the moment - and, strangely, he wouldn't have it any other way. He can't think of another person he'd trade Liam for, not even his own family - because really, having met Liam and known him, how could he reasonably say he would?

He sits there, supporting Liam's sleeping body, rubbing his back softly. At first, he does it over the blankets, and then, after a few moments' deliberation, he slides his hands underneath and starts rubbing Liam's skin gently. He knows he's not strictly supposed to let Liam sleep - something about heart rates slowing down and the body naturally cooling - but Liam feels warmer and his pulse is steady.

Still... he needs to check Liam's lucid. He jostles him a little, waiting until Liam groans reluctantly to say, "Hey. Liam. You awake?"

"Am now," Liam mumbles.

"Do you know where you are?"

"I'm cold, not concussed," Liam says groggily. "Our apartment. In your lap." 

"You're still cold?"

"Not as cold. You're warm."

"That's probably the fire," Brett says, but he hauls Liam in closer. "Reckon you can stay awake for a little while? Not that long, just enough that your body temperature goes back to normal."

"Mmhm," Liam mumbles. "Can I stay here?"

Brett hauls him in closer. Liam's pretty much as limp as a rag doll. "Stay as long as you want," he says, smiling a bit. Considering how reluctant Liam was to even touch him skin-to-skin, it's pretty adorable to have him snuggling up closer for warmth.

"Thanks," Liam croaks, lifting his eyes to meet Brett's. He looks almost shy. "For keeping me warm." 

"You're welcome," Brett says easily. 

Liam closes his eyes again. "Sure I can't sleep?"

"Not right now." Brett leans around him. "Readjust," he says. "You should drink some tea. It'll help warm you up, at any rate."

So Liam moves until he's sitting sideways on Brett's lap, legs across him, arm wrapped around Brett's shoulder. He uses his left hand to take the tea Brett hands him, and Brett realises belatedly that Liam's left-handed.

"That's why you could still shoot," he says.

Liam looks at him. He's still shivering faintly, but the tea seems to be helping. "Huh?"

"I just - I thought, when you hurt your hand last week, that you wouldn't be able to shoot," Brett says. "But you hurt your right hand."

Liam smiles a little. "Yeah. I'm left handed." He seems to shift closer to Brett after that, not saying much, but he's awake and alive and the shivering is beginning to cease. His skin doesn't feel as icy anymore, either. 

"You feeling better?" Brett asks.

"Yeah. I'm much warmer." Liam looks at him. "I'm really glad you knew all that stuff about the ice," he admits. "It was dumb to go out there."

Brett shakes his head. "We needed the ammo, you were right. It was the right thing to do, to check if he was okay. Besides, no harm no foul. We're both alright. I just hope you don't get sick."

"I feel okay," Liam says. "For now, anyway."

"Yeah. Soon as you're warmed up, I'm gonna go find some medicine. Just in case. You were coughing before you fell in the water." 

Liam doesn't argue with him. He might be stubborn, but he's also smart, and probably knows that Brett's reasoning is something along the lines of "better safe than sorry". He wraps the blanket around himself tighter and says, "You can leave whenever you want. I'm alright."

"You sure?" Brett asks.

"Yeah." Liam turns to look outside. "You've probably got two hours of solid daylight left." When he turns back to face Brett, his eyebrows are drawn together. "Be careful, okay?" he asks. "Stick to the back streets and don't be seen." 

"By who? The zombies?" Brett wonders.

Liam shakes his head. "That guy on the lake," he says. "He hadn't been dead long. Maybe a day. There are other people around. Be careful." 

"You think he was with people?" Brett asks. "He was out on the ice alone." 

Liam shrugs. "Just a hunch."

So far, every "hunch" Liam has had about anything has been pretty on the mark, so Brett stands up, takes his weapons, and says, "I'll be careful. Stay near the fire - keep drinking tea, okay? And if I'm not back by night-"

"I'll come looking for you," Liam says. 

Brett manages to hide his surprise. He didn't know Liam actually cared enough to come looking for him if something happened. 

"See you soon," Liam says, and Brett supposes that's his cue to leave.

~*~

He makes good time getting to the pharmacy.

He's pretty much emptied his pack of everything but the essentials, so when he arrives, he scoops the place out - no biters anywhere that he can see - and then swings his pack off his shoulders, going along the shelves and sweeping things in. He just wants to get back, really.

He's out in the store room, looting the supplies of antibiotics and other government-regulated medicine, when he hears a cough.

He doesn't think he's ever felt so startled; he jumps nearly a foot in the air and makes his way to the back of the storeroom, hiding behind some shelves. He's at least managed to loot anything useful.

_Liam was right. There are other people here. But why?_

"Found anything?"

There's more than one, Brett realises. There's at least three of them out there. He can hear their footsteps., echoing around the empty shop. There's something off about them, though, uneven, wrong. 

He hears that cough again - wet and rasping. He realises two things in that moment: that whoever these people are, they're sick, and that Liam's dry, wheezy cough sounds nothing like the throttling wetness of the ones he's hearing right now.

"Nah. Nothing." Another cough. "Place has been looted."

"You reckon recently?"

"Yeah. Look. Scuffs in the dust on the shelves." 

_Shit. Shit shit shit-_

There's a sudden round of gasping, then the noise of a body hitting the ground.

"Fuck! What the hell is-"

"Don't matter." Another cough, this one worse than the last. "We need to get out of here - Mr. Bossman will be expecting us back."

"We're better off staying gone if we don't bring anything."

"And there ain't nothin' here. So we try somewhere else."

Brett clutches a box of antibiotics in his hand and waits, breath baited and lungs aching, as he hears the two other men drag their companion out. 

He must stay there for nearly an hour, making sure they aren't going to come back, looting more of the shelves. Finally - when he sees the sun start to dip - he begins to make tracks back to the apartment, staying close to walls and away from the main streets, just like Liam told him to.

There's a few scant minutes of daylight left when he arrives, and he could almost swear Liam looks worried when he enters. "You okay?"

"Yeah," Brett breathes. "Listen, you were right. There are other people here." 

Liam straightens up. He's still got the blankets around him, but he's pulled on a long-sleeved sweatshirt. "How do you know?"

"Heard them," Brett says. He sits down and begins unloading the pack. "I was in the storeroom when they came in," he explains. "They were looking for meds. Only left without checking further because one of them collapsed. I think they were sick." 

Liam nods slowly. "Winter must've hit them hard," he murmurs. 

"What makes you say that?"

Liam looks up at him. He's still a little pale, but it's been barely four hours since Brett dragged him out of the water. "The Keepers," he says slowly, "they're um..."

He stops for a moment, looks at Brett blankly. Brett tilts his head.

"Sorry," Liam says. "It's hard to think."

"Yeah. Falling in ice will do that. Try again."

Liam rubs his face. "They're sort of - I don't know, really strict? They're a pretty strong force, but that's only because they kill you if you're sick, weak, or unable to work. There's no such thing as taking care of their own. It's every man for himself. So if they were out, sick, looking for medicine to take back, they must be pretty seriously low on supplies. And people to find them." 

"Isn't their base ages away?" Brett asks. "On the other side of the city?"

"Yeah, that's another thing," Liam says. "They never normally stray this far from their own tunnels. I've never known them to do that and I've been here more than a year." 

Brett shivers. "Yeah?"

Liam looks at him appraisingly. "You're cold."

"What was your first clue?"

Liam watches him for another long moment. Then, slowly, he lifts his arm, offering the blanket to Brett. Brett smiles.

"You kept me warm," Liam mumbles. 

"Suppose I did, huh?" Brett moves closer, wraps the bundle of blankets and cloth that's Liam up in his arms, and sighs as he almost immediately begins to thaw out. "Is that my sweatshirt?"

"Sorry," Liam says, clearly flustered. "Mine's wet. Um, you can have it back-"

"Hey, it's okay. Don't stress. Keep it until you're warm."

"I'm pretty warm." Liam leans around him. "Find what you were looking for?"

Brett sighs. It's nice to be close to someone, to feel Liam's smaller body moving in his arms, to feel him breathing and alive and okay right there.

"Yeah," he says, just as he feels Liam gather the courage to speak again. "I found it. If you start getting sick, we'll have medicine." Then, after a long moment's hesitation, he wraps his arms tightly around Liam's back and waist, squeezes him in close. He's intending to let Liam go, after a moment, before the embrace gets weirdly long, but he doesn't want to. Liam's a warm, solid weight in his arms, the only person Brett knows he's definitely got on his side. And he doesn't want to let go.

There's a long pause. Brett can practically hear the gears turning in Liam's head, trying to work out what's going on. And this is probably very weird for him - Liam outright admitted he hasn't touched or been touched by anyone in more than a year - but he doesn't pull away. Another few long seconds pass.

He feels Liam move, and thinks, for a moment, that Liam's pulling away. But he's not - he's attempting to free his arms, and once he has, he wraps his arms around Brett too, hesitantly, like he can't quite remember how hugs work. He puts his head on Brett's shoulder, heaving a sigh, and stays still. 

Okay. So Liam doesn't seem to mind this. Maybe he's even enjoying it. It is true he's holding on very loosely, but that's alright. Maybe Liam's just not a hugger. 

"Never would've pegged you for being a Care Bear," Liam grumbles, and Brett laughs. Because yeah, Liam might be grumbling, but Brett can tell the difference, by now, between genuine irritation and affected irritation, and he thinks Liam's probably pretending to not like this hug. 

"You warmer?" Brett asks.

"Yeah. I feel less and less like a popsicle with every passing moment." 

Brett raises his hand, absently, and puts it on Liam's forehead, not expecting the full-body flinch it elicits. He pulls back, but Liam's not looking at him, has his face turned away so Brett can't see it. 

"Sorry," Brett says, surprised. "I didn't mean to scare you."

"It's fine," Liam mumbles. "Try again. I guess."

He doesn't sound like he wants Brett to, but Brett wants to check his temperature, so he does - finds Liam's forehead again and leaves his hand there for a moment, using his thumb to stroke Liam's skin absently. He hopes the action is soothing.

"What're you doing, anyway?" Liam mutters.

"Just checking your temperature," Brett says. "But it feels okay."

"I have a thermometer," Liam says.

Brett feels thoroughly confused. So Liam flinched when Brett touched him, but didn't bother telling Brett he actually owns a proper thermometer. Does that mean he wants Brett to touch him? Then why did he flinch?

"Well, I guess you're okay for now," Brett says hesitantly. Liam's still hugging him, but he's all tensed up now. "Listen, I'm sorry about-"

"Don't be," Liam says. "I'm just a nervous wreck. It's no big deal." 

"If I do or say anything that makes you feel uncomfortable-"

"You don't," Liam snaps, and Brett realises he's doing it right now - bringing it up, bringing attention to it, is making Liam uncomfortable. 

Liam sighs deeply then. "I am so fucked up," he says gloomily.

"No you're not," Brett says. "Considering everything I think you're doing pretty well." 

"Is this really what "pretty well" looks like to you?" Liam asks dully. "I threatened to kill you three times within half an hour of meeting you."

"I didn't take it personally," Brett assures him.

He's being sincere, so he's kind of surprised when Liam starts laughing, shakes his head, and says, "Man, I'm lucky I ran into you and not some axe-crazy psycho. You didn't call my bluff."

"Your bluff?" Brett asks.

"I've only killed one person," Liam says, "and that was because they asked me to." 

Brett feels like the ground's dropped out from underneath him. "You've never killed anyone?" he asks dumbly.

"Nope. Sure fooled you, though," Liam says. "I was fifteen, man. How did you think I survived this long?"

"I thought you were gonna shank me!" Brett says heatedly.

"That was the idea. I'm an okay actor, I guess." Liam winces then. "Sorry."

"You were never gonna kill me?" Brett demands.

Liam shakes his head meekly.

"Oh. Well. Nice to know. You could've told me that sooner," Brett says weakly. 

"I'll keep that in mind for next time." But Liam's smiling, and as he leans forward to pick up his mug of tea, Brett feels the fingers of his other hand wrap into Brett's shirt, like he's steadying himself.

It might've taken him two months, but slowly, he's earning Liam's trust. And it feels pretty good. 

~*~

Liam's temperature is back to normal two hours later, and he's curled up in the bed, watching Brett drowsily. Brett's pretending to read, but really, he's listening to Liam's soft, clear breathing and thanking every higher power he knows of that Liam doesn't seem to have gotten sick.

"When're you gonna go to sleep?" Liam yawns.

"Am I keeping you awake?" Brett asks. The truth is, his cot isn't exactly comfortable or even all that warm, no matter how close he drags it to the fire. He knows Liam's been suffering the effects of the cold too, has woken up to Liam's teeth - or his own - chattering with the bite of cold in the air.

Liam shakes his head. "No. Not really. You just haven't turned a page in like half an hour."

Brett flushes. "Noticed that, huh?" 

Liam nods, yawning again. "You should sleep," he says, his own voice heavy with the need for it. "Especially after today, you probably need it."

"So do you," Brett says pointedly.

Liam shrugs.

There's a long pause. Brett puts his book away, watching as Liam's eyes begin to slowly blink shut. 

"You should sleep up here," Liam says fuzzily.

"What?" Brett demands, suddenly wide awake.

"You should sleep up here," Liam clarifies, forcing his eyes open and pinning Brett with a look. "You look cold. Bring all the blankets up here or something. It'll be warmer." 

"You don't mind?" Brett asks dubiously.

"If I did I wouldn't have asked," Liam says sleepily. "Come on."

So Brett picks up the blankets and pillows on his cot and moves to the bed. Liam shuffles over so that he's against the wall, watching as Brett climbs in and spreads the blankets over them. 

Liam smiles sleepily when Brett lies down beside him. "Don't worry," he says. "I'll stay on my side and everything. You don't have to cuddle me or anything like that."

Brett laughs a little. "I haven't slept in the same bed as someone else for a long time." 

There's a long pause. For a moment, Brett thinks Liam has fallen asleep, until Liam's voice comes from his pillow quietly, "I haven't slept in the same bed as anyone ever."

Brett closes his eyes. "Sorry it has to be with me."

"It's not so bad," Liam yawns. "You're bigger than me. The zombies will get you first."

"Oh, _nice_." Brett rolls onto his side, facing Liam. The urge to snuggle up to him - to absorb Liam's body warmth and scent - is overpowering. And Liam said Brett didn't have to cuddle him, not that it was strictly _banned_ , so Brett shuffles closer and slings an arm across Liam's stomach, sighing.

Liam goes tense for a moment, then relaxes. Brett's nose is on Liam's shoulder, and Liam's intensely warm, like a furnace, a moving heater. 

"Brett?" Liam asks timidly.

"Shut up," Brett says tiredly. "I'm not gonna jump you. You're just really warm and I'm really comfy." 

Liam laughs, a little awkwardly. "Okay. Yeah." 

He might be tired, but it takes Brett a while to fall asleep. He counts Liam's breaths by the rise and fall of his stomach, only stopping when he realises Liam is well and truly asleep.

That's when he closes his eyes, curls in closer, and drifts off into sleep.


	7. Chapter Seven - Tension, Drafts, and Bad News

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hiiii! I hope you all had a great Christmas! Thanks for all the lovely comments and holiday well-wishes ^_^ Enjoy!

**Chapter Seven - Tension, Drafts And Bad News**

**Liam's P.O.V**

So, the thing is, Liam definitely owes Brett his life. 

He seriously thought he was gonna die after falling in that ice, and he wouldn't have known how to get out on his own. So his life, really, and its continued existence, is all on Brett. And Liam can't quite work out a way to repay him.

Not to mention he's been exceptionally shitty lately. Because yeah, Brett saved his life - and then kept him warm by stripping him buck naked and rubbing his skin and forcing Liam to sit on him for warmth - and Liam fell asleep on him, for fuck's sake, because he felt so tired and so safe - and Liam's feeling pretty confused about everything. 

So what does Liam do when he's confused? He lashes out. He's trying to change that but it's not like he ever learned healthy coping methods. More to the point, he doesn't know how to. He hasn't had to reason with someone for so long it's like he's completely forgotten how.

Things come to a head about four days after Brett dragged his sorry, soggy ass out of the frozen lake. Liam's in a spectacularly awful mood as soon as he wakes up because there's a cold draft in the apartment and that means there's a fucking hole somewhere. Which Liam now has to find, first of all, and patch up. And seriously? He didn't even get to take a shop class in high school because he was too fucking young. He doesn't know how to fix shit. 

He doesn't even know what he says to warrant it - maybe something about nothing ever going right - but he knows he isn't specifically talking about or even _to_ Brett when he says it. In fact, he's halfway into his next sentence when Brett snaps, "Do you seriously bitch and moan about everything? You aren't the only one who's got it fucking rough," and Liam's so surprised he snaps his jaw shut and falls totally silent. 

It's a few things, really, that make him shut up - like that Brett's never snapped at him before, ever, or that Liam hasn't been reproached or challenged for years, or that Brett's tone and even his posture matches the way his deadbeat dad used to look and sound right before he knocked back a few fingers of whiskey and then Liam, usually into the wall or surrounding furniture, just hard enough to make him sorry for existing.

He's so thoroughly stunned by Brett's reaction that he honestly doesn't even begin to feel hurt for a good five minutes. And then, once he does, he's not sure of what to do - he hasn't felt this kind of pain in a long time - so he just gets up and leaves. It's not even that he's trying to throw a tantrum, or that he feels like he's going to cry or some wimpy bullshit like that. He just doesn't know what else to do so he goes.

He never had the luxury of leaving when he was getting whaled on by his dad. So this is sort of new to him. 

He doesn't really have much to do, though, that's the thing. It's not snowing today but the city is blanketed in it, and it's turning to grey slush beneath his feet. It's cold out, but not so bad that it warrants him going back. He's not sure what would be worse - Brett still being pissed at him, or Brett being sorry. Liam's gonna feel awkward as fuck either way. 

Eventually, with some purpose, he heads to the Nordstrom Brett broke into a while ago and loots some more winter clothes, whatever he can carry. Then he finds a notepad and a pen and sits down on one of the ridiculously expensive display couches and chews his thumb as he tries to think of something to write. 

In the end, he settles for writing - in really awful, messy handwriting, because he hasn't had a reason to write anything by hand for two years - _I'm sorry I'm such a pain in the ass_ and then tucks the notepad and pen into his backpack before heading back. And he's timed it well; Brett's asleep when he gets back because it's pretty much dark out, and Liam leaves the note on his jacket so he'll see it. 

He sleeps pretty badly, worrying that he's really fucked up now, and that Brett - who was never going to want him the way Liam wants him to want him - isn't even going to want to stay with him for the rest of winter. He's not ready to let go of Brett. To be alone again.

When he gets the first hint of the sun rising, he's up and out the door. He thinks Brett stirs as he leaves but something about Brett reading the note and catching him makes him scared, and for a moment, he thinks about going back in and crumpling the note up and pretending nothing ever happened.

But he can't do that. Because Brett's right and he's sort of bitchy and moany and he's sure as shit not a very good companion. He knows that. So he owes Brett an apology and that's that.

He finds some more food that day, even finds some books Brett might like. He takes those back too - they're heavy, but maybe it can be a peace offering or something. It's quiet out, and by the time he gets back, he's strung out and stressed and - okay, he feels like he could cry. He's not good at dealing with stuff. And he doesn't know how to talk himself down when it comes to it. He feels like he's been chasing his own tail in circles for the better part of two days, and, predictably, that has gotten him absolutely nowhere. 

As he rounds the corner to the apartment, he's pretty surprised to find Brett sitting on the steps with a book. He looks up when he hears Liam, spots him, and immediately stands.  
"Where the hell have you been?" Brett demands.

Liam stops walking. "I, um-" He starts turning - he's perfectly willing to go somewhere else just to avoid being yelled at, because he's already got heart palpitations just thinking about the discussion they're about to have.

"No, no no, don't-" Brett's coming down the steps, his hand outstretched. "Don't take off again, okay?" 

"I didn't take off," Liam mumbles. "You could've found me. I was never more than a mile away." 

Brett looks surprised at that. "Oh." He looks kind of put out, now. "I got your note."

"Yeah. I left it where you could see it."

Brett steps forward again, hesitantly, like he's trying not to scare Liam off. "You aren't a pain in the ass," he says gently. "I'm sorry I snapped at you. Okay? I shouldn't have. You didn't do anything wrong, Liam."

"I was bitching and moaning," Liam says uncomfortably. 

Brett shakes his head. "You weren't that bad," he says. "I just lost my temper. And I never meant to drive you away like that, okay? This is your home. I'm sorry you felt like you had to leave."

"I didn't-" Liam's feeling pretty flustered, now, because Brett doesn't understand where he's coming from at all. "I didn't feel like I had to leave. I just - didn't want to stay either. I wasn't running away or anything. I just didn't know what to do." 

Brett nods slowly. "I'm sorry," he says slowly. "Are you gonna take off again?"

"I'm not - I didn't-" Liam stutters.

"Okay," Brett says gently. "You wanna at least come inside? It's fucking cold. You look like you're freezing."

Liam shrugs, faux-casual, and heads towards Brett. Brett lets him pass through into their apartment first, and Liam sighs as he feels the warmth of the fire on his face. He strips off his jacket and heads in, putting the bag down and dropping onto one of the pillows near the fire. 

Brett sits down slowly. "You hungry?"

Liam nods. He wants to make eye contact, but he can't bring himself to lift his head. He's worried his apology wasn't enough. It's not like it was much of one. Brett's being nice, and he seems genuinely regretful that Liam's so strung out about it, but his dad was like that too and it never took long for his behaviour to revert back either.

"Hey." He feels Brett's hand on his wrist. "What're you doing?"

Liam realises he's been chewing his nails and drops his hand. "Biting my nails," he says reluctantly.

"Why?"

Liam shrugs. 

Brett must decide it's not worth pursuing, because he goes and finds some packaged deer and spears it to heat it up. Meanwhile, Liam starts unloading his bag, eventually getting to the books at the bottom.

"I found these," he says apprehensively, holding them out. "I don't even know if you like this genre."

Brett takes them, smiling. "I'll read pretty much anything I can get my hands on," he says. "Where'd you find them?"

Liam looks down at his feet. "Bookstore," he mumbles. 

There's a long silence. "You went specifically to a bookstore?"

"Yeah." Liam pokes at the fire. "You finished that other one," he mutters. "The one that looks like it could be a weapon if you tried hard enough." 

Brett laughs. "Noticed that, huh?"

"Yeah." 

Brett shifts closer to him. "Look, Liam, I'm-"

"Don't apologise again," Liam pleads. "Okay? Please. I'm not angry or upset or whatever it is you think I am. I don't know what I am. And I don't know how to tell you something I don't have the answer to. I'm just confused, okay?" 

"About what?" Brett asks softly. 

"I don't know how to repay you for getting me out of the ice," Liam admits. "And I got confused and I lashed out. It's my thing. I need to change it but I don't know how." 

"I didn't do it so you'd owe me," Brett says gently. "Isn't that what you said to me when you saved me from walkers? Well, it's the same deal here. Besides, you brought me books. Consider us even." 

Liam finally feels like it's okay to meet Brett's eyes, and he even manages to smile a little.

"That's better," Brett says. "And... if you want to change, really want to change, I can try to help you." Brett sighs. "In my last group, I saw a few kids," he says. "And they were totally fucked up. No concept of right or wrong, discipline versus abuse, no idea how to vocalise or properly express what they were feeling."

Liam pokes the fire gloomily.

"I'm not saying you're like that," Brett says softly. "But you were - how old were you when this hit?"

"Fifteen," Liam answers, voice nearly a whisper.

"Fifteen. And I can see that you're struggling with some of the stuff that I only learned later on in life, and that was pre-zombies," Brett says. "I know you don't want to tell me how you feel, and that your instinct is to lash out and protect yourself. I get it. But even if you don't know how you're feeling and why - just tell me. That something's up. Then I'll know." 

Liam swallows. "It's not that I don't want to," he mumbles. "It's that I don't know how."

Brett smiles. "I can work with that." 

~*~

Liam wakes up to an elbow in the face while it's still dark.

"Hey," he protests sleepily. "Knock it the fuck off."

He's not surprised Brett's in bed with him - barring last night, since Liam's incident with the ice, they've pretty much slept together. To conserve warmth, of course. At least, Liam tells himself that. He adamantly does not consider the fact that every night, they go to sleep with their backs touching, but by morning, Brett's usually rolled over and has an arm draped over Liam's waist.

He wasn't lying when he told Brett he's never slept in the same bed as anyone before. He hasn't. His parents didn't let him have sleepovers with Garrett and he was fairly sure that being fifteen and gay in the apocalypse was likely to get him murdered, so they kept it down low. He's not sure anyone in his group knew. 

It's nice, though. To sleep with Brett, wake up occasionally because Brett's making weird little noises in his sleep, to know that he's there.

Except tonight, because tonight Brett is thrashing around and Liam just barely manages to avoid a kick to the nuts as Brett jerks over.

"Brett," he says hesitantly, reaching out. It's beginning to dawn on him that Brett's having a nightmare. "Brett, wake up. It's okay."

Brett flails once more before he's snapping awake, eyes open and glazed with fear. Liam reaches out - to do what, he doesn't know - but Brett flinches from his hand.

Liam freezes, then withdraws his hand slowly. "It was just a dream," he says timidly.

"Hey," Brett croaks. "You okay?"

"Yeah. You elbowed me in the face, but yeah."

He's downright shocked when Brett reaches out and palms his cheek and jaw gently. "Sorry."

Liam tries to hide his blush as he sinks back down onto his pillow. "Um," he says. "What were you...?"

Brett shakes his head. "Just about what happened," he says. "To my group. When winter hit, and then the zombies after that." He turns his head to Liam. "I'm sorry I woke you up."  
"That's okay." Liam means it. "Maybe you should read to take your mind off it."

Brett nods. "I don't wanna keep you awake," he says.

"You won't," Liam yawns.

He's surprised when Brett retrieves his book and then comes back to bed. He settles in, sitting up, as Liam watches him drowsily. "What're you reading?" he asks.

"House Of Leaves," Brett says. "You couldn't have picked me up a more complicated book. I like it though. Very thought provoking."

Liam feels his eyes beginning to shut. "Nerd," he mumbles.

"Oh, go fuck yourself," Brett laughs. "You told me you saw Guardians of the Galaxy seven times in theatres."

"Good movie. Would recommend."

"I know. I saw it too." 

Liam watches as Brett opens the book, then turns the page. He gathers up some courage - and in the morning if he's asked he'll say he was deliriously tired and unaware of what he was doing - and curls up on Brett's side, his arm thrown over Brett's stomach and his head pillowed somewhere in the vicinity of his ribs.

For one terrifying moment, Brett tenses, like he wants to move away. Then his arm comes down over Liam's shoulders and pulls him almost imperceptibly closer. 

He hears Brett clear his throat. "This is not for you," he murmurs.

"Huh?" Liam asks groggily. 

Brett clears his throat again, softer this time. "Introduction," he murmurs. " _I still get nightmares. In fact I get them so often I should be used to them by now. I'm not. No one ever really gets used to nightmares_."

Liam realises, belatedly, that Brett's reading aloud to him. He settles in. 

" _For a while there I tried every pill imaginable. Anything to curb the fear. Excedrin PMs, Melatonin, L-tryptophan, Valium, Vicodin, quite a few members of the barbital family. A pretty extensive list, frequently mixed, often matched, with shots of bourbon, a few lung rasping bong hits, sometimes even the vaporous confidence trick of cocaine. None of it helped..._ "

Liam wants to listen to the way Brett's warm voice wraps around the words, but he can't keep up and his eyes are closed and before he knows it, he can't hear anything at all. 

~*~

He wakes up with the sun beaming down on him and Brett's heartbeat thumping steadily beneath his ear.

He blinks, licks his lips. His head is on Brett's chest, a leg over his waist, and damn, he's doing a great impression of a fucking sloth on a tree. He's clinging to Brett like his life depends on it.

Brett's lips are on his forehead, they're so close. And for a moment, Liam wants to move so that this isn't awkward for Brett when they awaken. And then he decides not to because he's so warm and comfortable and Brett feels safe.

"Morning," Brett says, and Liam jumps.

"Hi," he says guiltily. 

"You fell asleep on me," Brett teases. 

"... You're comfy. It's your fault." 

Brett huffs a laugh. "Was House Of Leaves really that boring?"

"No, I was enjoying it," Liam yawns. "But I was so tired." 

Brett nods slowly. "You seemed like it." He doesn't mention the nightmare. "Mind if I get up?"

"Oh. Oh, yeah. Sorry." Liam moves back to his part of the bed. "Hey, I wanna go out today," he says. "If the Keepers are actually around we need to figure out how far they've advanced towards us. They're bad news. We can't afford to be around when they are."

"Okay," Brett says. "But can we eat first?" 

~*~

Breakfast is quiet. Liam's sleepy and hungry so his main priority is eating his oatmeal without falling asleep in it, and Brett's just chattering away to him quietly.

"Does it annoy you?" Brett asks at one point. "When I talk like that?"

"No. It's good," Liam says sleepily. "I like it." 

They pack up soon after and head out. Out here, there's not a lot of talking - they're focussed on staying safe, alive and unbitten, looking for supplies and people and signs that the Keepers have advanced. 

It's cold out, the wind whipping across the landscape and through the buildings like horses through an open gate, and Liam shivers. He's never wanted a scarf more than he does right now, just to protect his neck and ears better.

"Colder than last winter," Brett stammers.

"Yeah." It's even begun to snow. "We need to make this quick and get back in." 

"Lead the way, captain," Brett says.

Liam does, threading his way confidently between parked, abandoned cars, motorcycles and any suspicious lumps in the snow.

"I remember growing up, Mom used to tell me to stay away from any grass taller than my feet," he says. "Because it could've had snakes in it. Or a whole host of deadly spiders and ticks and other fucking nasty things I didn't wanna think about." Liam shakes his head. "Weird now that we have to stay away from the snow in case those lumps are zombies."

"My mom always told me to stay away from deep snow in case there was black ice underneath," Brett says. "She also used to tell me it was possible to drown in less than an inch of water."

"Really?" Liam asks. "I didn't know that." 

"Are there really that many dangerous animals in California?" Brett asks.

"Not Cali," Liam responds. "I grew up in Texas until I was nine or ten." He steps warily around a pile of snow next to a car. "When I moved to California and refused to play in the tall grass with my friends they made fun of me. But I was too worried about snakes. And ticks, and spiders..."

"You know what else is in the tall grass?" Brett asks.

"What?" Liam asks curiously, genuinely thrown by the question.

Brett grins. "Pokémon." 

Liam has to laugh at that. "Yeah. All those fucking Zubats and shit."

"And Rattatas," Brett chuckles. "I bet you were petrified of those, right?"

Liam holds his hands up, smiling. "You got me." He can't help but smile wider when Brett laughs again. It's nice to be able to lighten the mood a little. 

"I don't think my mom realised how bad she scarred me," Liam chuckles. "Every time my stepdad used to mow the lawn I'd feel so fucking free. Like I could take Meatball-"

"Who's Meatball?"

"My dog. I could take her out after the lawns had been mowed and not end up with Lyme disease or some shit like that."

Brett stops to look at him, and Liam turns back. "You named your dog Meatball?" Brett asks flatly.

"She looked like a meatball!" Liam says defensively. "She was all brown and red and stripy and stuff. And fat." He rubs his neck. "Probably 'cause I _fed_ her too many meatballs," he mumbles guiltily. 

Brett nods. "I had a turtle."

"What!" Liam laughs. "A turtle? Seriously?"

"His name was Pickles," Brett says. 

"And you were shitting on me for Meatball."

"I didn't name him!" Brett says. "My sister did. Lori. She had really bad allergies to anything with fur, so we couldn't get cats, or dogs, or even a fucking hamster. Mom wanted to teach us how to be responsible, though, so when I was ten she got me a turtle. I couldn't think of a name and he was green, so... Pickles." 

"Turtles look nothing like pickles," Liam says dubiously. 

"Maybe you're just blind," Brett says.

"Maybe you're just stupid," Liam says, and laughs when Brett's jaw drops. "Yeah. I'm gonna go with stupid." 

He didn't realise, but they're heading towards the Nordstrom store. "Wanna pick up some scarves or something?" he asks. "My ears are fucking frozen."

"Sounds good." Brett follows him in and begins to look around; Liam hesitates, then turns to him.

"What happened to your family?" he asks. "You mentioned your mom and sister..."

Brett nods. "My dad died when I was eleven," he says. "Aggressive osteosarcoma in his leg, metastasised to his lungs and kidneys. Initially misdiagnosed as pain from an old injury. Took them two months to find it... took him four months to die." 

Liam flinches. "I'm sorry," he says. 

Brett shrugs. 

Liam doesn't want to press about his mother and sister, now, but it turns out he doesn't have to, because Brett continues on after a moment. "Mom was only just getting over it when I went to college," he says. "Lori doesn't - didn't - really remember him by the time the apocalypse rolled around. She was three when he was diagnosed."

Liam nods silently.

"I don't really know what happened to them," Brett murmurs. "I went to college in DC. They were still in Minnesota... when I realised what was going down I tried calling, but nobody answered, and when I tried again the lines were down. They never went back up after that, either. Oakridge is in the DC area. I'm hoping if I head that way, I might... I don't know. Run into them, or find them there..." 

Liam swallows. He can tell, just by Brett's tone of voice, that he doesn't need to tell Brett that his mom and little sister are probably long dead or infected. And there's no point saying it, because not only is it obvious, it'll just pour salt on the wound. 

"Your parents?" Brett asks. "Family?"

"No siblings," Liam says. "Just me. My stepdad, I don't know. He might've gotten out of the hospital. But Mom, I never... saw her again. Last time I did was when she was trying to get me to take my Risperdal - uh, my anti-psychotic - and I uh, didn't. Which is why I ended up in a fight at school and then at the hospital."

"Anti-psychotic?" Brett asks.

"I have I.E.D," Liam says. "Or, um, Intermittent Explosive Disorder. I used to be medicated for it, but I'm not anymore... anti-psychotics are hard to find just lying around. Anyway, I haven't had an episode in a year or more." 

"So it's okay?"

"It's okay." 

Brett throws a scarf to him, a plain black one. "Sorry about your family," he says.

"It's okay." Liam looks around. "We should go," he says. "Maybe if we get home soon enough I can try and find that fucking hole. Patch it up." 

"Do you know how?" Brett asks, amused.

"I'll work it out," Liam grumbles as he leads the way out of Nordstrom. "Can't be that fucking hard, can it?"

"You know, I used to help my grandpa out around his farm," Brett says. "I can look at it."

Liam blinks. "Okay. Thanks." He falls back to walk beside Brett. "You really think you can fix it?"

"Yeah, as long as it's not too serious." 

Liam grits his teeth as they enter the freezing wind again. "Which pharmacy did you see them at?" he asks, voice shaking.

"It was this way." Brett sets off. "You okay?"

"I'm fuckin' cold," Liam whines.

"You really aren't used to it, are you?"

"Dude. Texas. California. What do you think?" 

Brett laughs a little. "Here. Walk behind me. Might break the wind a little bit." He's got both hands shoved into his pockets, tilts his head back towards Liam a bit as he says, "Have you seen anything?"

"No. Nothing." None of the Keepers' telltale markers are around to indicate that they've passed through here, that they've claimed this land. But Brett said he saw them, and Liam believes him, so he keeps his eyes open and pays attention.

Eventually, they reach the pharmacy. By the time they do, Liam's not convinced he'll ever be warm again; he steps out of the wind, just inside the door, and pauses for a moment, shivering violently and hoping he doesn't get sick - that neither of them get sick. He dodged a bullet when he didn't get sick after falling through the ice. 

He supposes that if either of them do end up struck out with flu or fever, they at least have medicine. And where that's concerned Brett mostly seems to know what he's talking about, so Liam feels... not okay about it all, but at least reassured.

Brett's hand lands on his shoulder. "You okay?" he asks worriedly. "Jesus, you're as pale as a sheet." 

"I'm okay now we're out of the wind," Liam says. He's not looking forward to the trek home. 

"Yeah. The cold is okay - it's the wind that really bites," Brett agrees. "At least we won't lose our ears." 

Liam nods. "Split up?" he asks. 

"Yeah." Brett turns and smiles. "You take the storeroom. I'll take the front."

"'Kay." Liam makes his way to the back of the room, jumping over the counter quietly and beginning to head round the back. 

He notices the smell before anything else; it's so bad it almost makes him woozy, his stomach rolling threateningly in protest. He drags his scarf up over his face, breathing through his mouth, and continues forward.

He thinks it's probably just some dumb animal that wandered in here and got stuck, or fell through the roof, or something like that. Until he steps around a row of shelves and sees a pair of shoes on the ground in front of him.

He forgets to breathe through his mouth, and the stench of rot and death fills his nose; he's got about five seconds before he's bent over and puking into a nearby bucket, barely missing his shoes. He hasn't ever smelled anything that putrid before.

He hears Brett call his name, the sounds of his footsteps heading closer. Soon enough, Brett's hand is on his back.

"You okay?"

"Smells bad," Liam gasps. "Don't go back there." 

Brett wraps his scarf around his face and ignores Liam's advice. Liam groans, steels himself, and follows suit - it might smell foul back there but Brett needs someone to cover him. And Liam's a little more prepared this time.

Well, for the smell. When he rounds the corner, he sees the body is bloated and red, swollen like a blimp. He manages to keep a lid on the nausea this time, takes in the pink, frothy foam around the mouth and next to the body - and on the floor a few feet away, next to a sleeping bag.

He also sees the blue cloth around the man's neck, and his heart throbs uncomfortably, anxiously. He's about to say something, but Brett's taking his arm and dragging him out of there.

He lets Brett pull him to the front of the pharmacy and pulls his scarf away from his face. "So?" he asks breathlessly.

"Pneumonia," Brett says. "That stuff on the floor? I saw that happen to lots of members of my own group last winter. It must've been one of the guys who was sick - the ones I ran into." 

Liam nods. "He was one of the Keepers," he says. "They all wear blue bandanas around their necks. You know, to signal to the others that they're friendly. But you said there were three of them. And that they left."

"One must've come back to double check," Brett says. "I bet we find the others around. Between being sick and exposure to the weather, they probably didn't last very long." He turns to look at the store room. "He's been dead about a week, ten days," Brett says. "I mean, it's cold. So maybe a little longer."

"How do you know all that?" Liam asks.

"I took a forensics class in college," Brett says. "Actually, I took a few. Some chemistry as well." He frowns at Liam. "Are you sure you're okay? Why'd you puke?"

"How didn't you?" Liam asks indignantly. "It smelled fucking awful back there."

Brett laughs a little. "I guess you prepared me for it," he teases. "Come on, you should eat something. And we should get back anyway. It's getting colder."

"I didn't even know that was possible," Liam moans. "How much colder can it fucking get?"

"A lot colder," Brett warns.

"Excellent," Liam mutters.

~*~

They find two more of the Keepers behind the pharmacy. One, with his guts ripped out, in the middle of the street two blocks away - turned, too. He groans as they approach, begins to roll a little.

Liam puts an arrow through his head and then goes to retrieve it. That's when he spots another body, a hundred or so yards away, slumped down in front of a frozen yoghurt store of all places.

"How many did you say you heard?" Liam asks softly.

"Three." Brett seems to realise the implications of this just as well as Liam does. "These ones haven't been dead as long." 

"I'm worried about their numbers," Liam mumbles. "They had enough people to send scouts, I guess, for the first three. Not only that, one of them was torn apart by a walker. Which means the walkers are still active and around this winter, but they can only do that if they're fresh."

"Really?"

"The cold slows them down if they're old," Liam says. "If they're fresh they can still move. Not as fast. That guy must've been weak to let one get the jump on him in this weather."

"Do you know it was just one?"

"A herd - even just a group - would've devoured him, and we'd still be seeing them around." Liam shakes his head. "He wasn't devoured. He was just a snack."

Brett looks disturbed. "Don't talk about them like that," he reproaches. "They were people. Not popcorn."

"Sorry," Liam says timidly, worried he's giving Brett more and more of a reason to think he's completely unhinged. For a long time, the only way he could deal with anything was to refuse to see the people as... people. If he looked at them like they were vermin, or like they were just food for the zombies, it made it easier to get by. He has to keep reminding himself that he doesn't have to think about it like that anymore. He's coping better. Especially with Brett by his side. 

Brett's hand lands on his shoulder. "Don't worry about it," he says, and Liam takes a moment to try and work out if he's serious or not. He seems to be, doesn't seem angry. Just kind of thrown. 

"I don't really think they're food," Liam tries to explain as they head back. "I just didn't know how else to think about it when I was fifteen. I've never shaken it off." 

"It's okay," Brett reassures him. "It's fine. Whatever you have to do to get by, right? We've all been there." 

Liam nods. He's thankful when they arrive back, gets the fire started and pulls out his maps, finds the right one.

He's chewing his nails again when Brett sits down next to him and pulls on his wrist to get him to stop. He does, reluctantly, but starts subtly biting the inside of his cheek instead.

"What're you looking at?" Brett asks.

Liam points at the map. "So this is where we were today," he says, circling the pharmacy in red. "And these..." He goes right to the other side of the map and highlights four tunnels, "are where the Keepers are holed up."

Brett nods. "How far is that?"

"I don't know how far in miles," Liam admits. "Especially with all the roadblocks and stuff now. I do know it takes almost three days to get that far, and that's if you walk from dawn till dusk in summer."

Brett whistles. "They're a long fucking way from home, that's for damn sure." He's warm against Liam's side, sitting closer than he strictly has to. Liam doesn't even mind anymore - in fact, he sort of likes it. "So... why're they out this far?"

"They must've looted everything valuable in their zone," Liam says. "They're a big group; resources go fast. They must've been forced out this way. And if they're extending their territory..." Liam chews his lip, "which they will, because they've never canvassed an area without claiming it, then I need to get you out of here fucking soon."

"Me?" Brett asks. "Okay, sure. But what about you?"

Liam avoids his eyes. "What about me?" he asks. 

"You can't stay here if they're going to extend their territory," Brett says. "You said they aren't friendly. And by that you meant...?"

"They'd kill me if they found me here," Liam admits. 

Brett's jaw drops. "And you're considering staying?" 

"Not considering," Liam says. "I am." 

"Liam, you can't..." Brett trails off, staring down at him. They're barely inches apart. "Liam, they'll kill you," he says. "Why the hell would you even think about it?"

"I don't know where else to go, and I'm scared to leave, and what if my friends show up and I'm not here? What if-"

"Liam, you said yourself you haven't expected anyone to show up in months," Brett says pleadingly. "Don't risk it. Please. Please don't stay here."

Liam gazes up at Brett and thinks about how much he'd like to go with him, but he's afraid of running into other people and as boring and sometimes pointless all this seems, he's been okay here on his own, and the only time he's ever been in trouble is when others tried to hurt him. He wants to stay with Brett, but he doesn't want that to involve leaving. But he can't ask Brett to stay.

He's surprised when Brett wraps an arm around his shoulders, squeezes him. "Okay," he says softly. "Okay, fine. I can't make you leave. I know that. But the offer's still open, okay?"  
Liam nods. 

"Anyway," Brett says, letting him go. "I'm not leaving until we fix that hole."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I obviously do not own House Of Leaves. I just want to marry it.


	8. Chapter Eight - Death Rattle

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 'Tis the day for updates today! I finished an assignment and therefore had free time :P Enjoy!

**Chapter Eight - Death Rattle**

Brett wakes up to Liam's face pressed into the upper rungs of his ribcage.

He has to smile a little. Liam's been sleeping better since he got back from whatever the hell he was doing for those two days he was too scared to come back here, and almost every morning, Brett's woken up with Liam's smaller frame nestled up against his. Liam usually wakes up when he does, but today, he continues to sleep.

Brett takes him in. Liam's completely lax against him, curled up small, hair falling into his face and his mouth slightly open. Brett thinks he looks almost cute like this. 

Not that he'd ever tell Liam that, of course. Because Liam might be warming to him, but Brett's fairly sure he wouldn't appreciate someone four years older than him and the same gender calling him cute.

Brett resists the urge to cough, but the quaking of his chest must rouse Liam, who blinks his eyes open sleepily. His pupils are large, and he winces in the light, but Brett takes in the cool blue of his eyes and tries not to think about how beautiful they are. 

"Morning," Liam mumbles drowsily.

"Hi." He's surprised when Liam doesn't move from where he is. Although, he's starting to get the feeling that Liam actually doesn't mind being touched that much, as long as he's mostly the instigator of it and it isn't sudden. "You hungry?" 

"Hmm, no," Liam murmurs, and Brett realises his eyes are shut and that he's slipping back into sleep. 

"I'm gonna get up," Brett says gently, and Liam rolls away from him, pulling the covers around himself sleepily. Brett laughs a little, leans over to tuck the covers around Liam more securely.

He gets out of bed properly, heads straight to the fire to stoke it. He's ravenously hungry, but it takes a while for anything to be warm enough to cook with, so he has to wait. In the meantime, he heads outside to piss, praying and hoping with every fibre of his being that his dick doesn't shrivel up. 

That would be a bit shit, if, now, with the promise of meeting people on the horizon, he ended up unable to have sex. Because now that he's warm and fed and relatively safe, his main priority once he gets to Oakridge is to get laid.

He doesn't think about Liam. About whether or not Liam will come with him. About what he'll do if Liam stays here; what Liam will do if he stays here. It sucks too much to think about and they haven't crossed that bridge yet. Liam will probably burn the metaphorical bridge before he can cross it anyway.

He sighs, heading back inside, and looks at Liam, who's rolled onto his back and has one hand fisted into the covers near his shoulder. He's sleeping pretty peacefully. It took him a while, but eventually, once he'd adjusted to Brett's presence, he started sleeping a little easier. Longer, even. 

Brett notices the water over the fire boiling and starts making some tea and porridge. The moment it starts to cook through properly, Liam's blinking his eyes open.

"Awake for the food but not for the prep, as per usual," Brett teases.

Liam rolls clumsily to the edge of the mattress. "Is that strawberry?" he mumbles hopefully.

"Yeah. Just for you."

Liam stumbles out of bed, bringing a blanket with him, and sits down as close to Brett as he can. "You're the best," he says sleepily. 

"I know." Brett passes him a bowl. "Figure I owe you for how often you made food for me. And you still catch all our game."

Liam shrugs. "You'll learn eventually," he says. After that, he's quiet as he eats, waiting for the tea to cool down. Brett watches him quietly; Liam either doesn't notice or doesn't care. 

Winter doesn't really seem to have taken a toll on Liam; he's just as broad and sturdy as he was when he knocked Brett out. Liam's been eating a little less, lately, though, which Brett thinks might be related to the fact that there's a lot less game around. 

He smiles when Liam yawns and leans against him. Yeah, Liam's not worried about him being around anymore. He even seems to actively enjoy Brett's company. And he sure doesn't mind sharing the bed. 

"Need to fix that hole today," Liam yawns.

"Have we got what we need?"

Liam shrugs. "I've got some stuff. But I don't even know where it is, so I have to find it first, and then see if we've got everything."

"Want me to do anything?"

"Uh - maybe just see what we've got? With the food at stuff? I'll find the hole. It's a small place; can't be that hard."

"Have fun," Brett says absently, turning to their supplies.

He's almost done counting everything up when Liam returns, looking downright depressed. "What's up?" Brett asks worriedly.

"I found it. I just don't have anything I need to fix it."

"Okay. So we go to the closest hardware store-"

"Which is a two mile trek away," Liam finishes.

"Oh. Now I know why you looked like you sucked on a lemon," Brett says ruefully. "Okay, well... it can't be avoided, can it? Let's get everything together and go while it's still daylight."

Liam nods. "Yeah." He still looks miserable, even as he drags on jeans and layers of shirts, hoodies and jackets, finishing with his pack. Brett knows Liam hates the cold; he doesn't deal with it very well at all. He knows that the walking isn't the problem, here; Liam just doesn't really want to go outside.

He'd offer to go alone, but it's not exactly safe at the moment, with the snow, the temperature and the presence of Keepers in the area. So as much as he'd like to tell Liam not to worry, to stay here... he can't. 

They head out, and Brett tries to ignore Liam's almost desperate shivering. He stays close, walks ahead where he can to try and break the wind, but by the time they get to the hardware store, Liam's pale white and shaking from head to toe.

"Jesus, Liam." Brett rubs Liam's arms vigorously, trying to keep him warm. "You okay?"

"Just frozen," Liam stammers. "Good thing I don't plan on having kids, too."

Brett laughs. "Come on. Let's find what we need and go."

It's Liam who somehow knows where everything is - nails, a hammer, and a few pieces of wood to nail down over the area. Brett's the one who suggests insulated padding, in case the hole is big enough to warrant it.

He starts coughing when they're about to head out; Liam looks at him worriedly. "You okay?"

"I'm alright. Probably have the same cough you did a while ago." 

"Okay," Liam says uncertainly."Want me to carry some of your stuff?"

Brett swings his arm around Liam's shoulder, jostling him around a bit. "It's okay," he says kindly. "Yeah? It's fine." 

"Alright. If you say so." Liam doesn't look convinced, but he doesn't argue again. 

The walk back seems longer this time; even Liam's pace is slower than usual as they battle headwinds, more snow and frigid temperatures. It has to be below zero. 

When they get back, Brett hustles Liam over to the fire; they strip off their wet layers and start trying to warm up. Brett doesn't mind when Liam shuffles closer and presses into his side for warmth; it benefits him as well. And besides, Liam fits against him perfectly, what with their height difference. 

They sit quietly, drinking tea, for almost half an hour before Liam gives one final shiver and says, "Okay, I gotta get this patched up." 

"Want some help?"

"Yeah. Thanks."

So Brett follows him to the end of the hallway, and follows Liam's gaze when he points upwards. The hole is in the corner, in the ceiling, dripping icy water and seeping cold air into their apartment.

"Fuck," Brett says.

"Yeah." Liam looks suddenly put out. "I don't know if I can get up there, actually. I didn't even think of that."

"Got any chairs?"

Liam shakes his head silently. Brett moves closer, reaching up to see whether he can reach it - no dice. Even his arms aren't long enough, apparently. 

Brett stares up at the hole. "I can't reach it." 

Liam looks at him. Brett grins. "You wanna try?"

"Fuck you," Liam says moodily, and Brett laughs. "Actually, you know - I could probably reach it if I got on your shoulders or something." 

"Yeah?" Brett asks. "You wanna try?"

"Sure. Can you carry my weight, though?"

"As long as you don't wriggle too much, I should be fine," Brett says, kneeling on the floor. "Come on."

"I'm heavy, you know," Liam says as he climbs unsteadily onto Brett's shoulders.

"Uh huh." Brett grunts as he stands upright. "Oh, please. You aren't that heavy." Liam's thighs are slung over his shoulders, his stomach and pelvis pressed into Brett's head and neck. Brett tightens his hands around Liam's shins to steady him. And he's definitely not thinking about how much it turns him on to have his shoulders and head between Liam's thighs... definitely not. 

"You okay up there?" he asks, trying to convince his dick to sit the fuck down.

"Yup," Liam says, letting go of Brett's head to reach up. "Man, it looks nasty. Might be mould or something. Pass me the nails?"

Brett manages to pass up some nails and, after a moment, Liam says - his voice muffled - "An' the hammer?"

Brett realises Liam must have the nails in his mouth and tries not to laugh as he passes up the hammer and a piece of wood to nail down over the area. "Thi' won' fith it," Liam says. "Thill broken."

"You have such a wonderful way of pronouncing things with a dozen nails in your mouth, Liam," Brett says. "I can almost understand what you're saying."

"Futh 'ou." Liam starts hammering, and Brett has to quickly readjust his stance to stop Liam swaying back and forth dangerously. 

Finally, Liam's done, and Brett's legs are beginning to seize up. Liam's really not that heavy, but standing with an extra one fifty pounds on his shoulders is murder for his quads. One fifty? One sixty? Yeah, Liam's small, but he's also muscular, so it's kind of hard to tell.

"How much do you weigh?" he pants.

Liam sniffs. "None of your damn business."

Brett laughs. "Sorry." 

"Less than you," Liam says.

"Well yeah. You're little." 

"I'm not done growing."

"That's true," Brett says, because he doesn't have the heart to tell Liam that if he hasn't grown since he was fifteen, he's probably not gonna. It's not like Liam needs to grow any taller anyway; he's enough of a badass without being Brett's height.

And Brett still thinks that, too. Liam might've told him otherwise a few days ago, but Brett knows Liam's tough as bulletproof Kevlar and isn't afraid of showing it. 

Liam jumps when Brett coughs again. "Seriously," he says. "Are you okay? You've been doing that a lot."

"It's fine," Brett says, trying not to feel irritated with the question - Liam's only asking because he cares, which, frankly, is not a point Brett ever thought their relationship would actually reach. "Trust me, okay?"

"Yeah. I do. Just - it sounds bad. Wet. Not like mine did."

"We'll keep an eye on it," Brett says, mostly to try and soothe the disconcerted look on Liam's face. "Yeah? If it gets worse we have medicine and stuff. No big deal."

Liam nods.

"Lunch?" Brett asks.

"Yeah. Okay." Liam's already heading over to the food. "Did you finish counting?"

"Yeah. We've got plenty. Might wanna get out there and get hunting once winter's cleared out and the deer are back, though."

"Mm. Had the same trouble last winter." Liam starts dividing up a package of deer meat and some tinned beans. Brett sits down near the fire, trying to keep the rattle in his chest under control. Liam doesn't need to hear it.

"Are you still reading House Of Leaves?" Liam asks.

Brett blinks. "Yeah."

"Cool." And Liam doesn't meet his eyes, doesn't even look in his direction, but suddenly Brett thinks he might know what Liam's trying to get at - in his own hedgy kind of way. He smiles a little, picks the book up, and flicks it open. 

" _This much I'm certain of_ ," Brett murmurs, pretending not to notice Liam's eager expression as he looks up. " _It doesn't happen immediately. You'll finish and that will be that, until a moment will come, maybe in a month, maybe a year, maybe even several years. You'll be sick or feeling troubled or deeply in love or quietly uncertain or even content for the first time in your life. It won't matter_." 

Liam's not even pretending to do anything anymore. He's hanging onto every word, looking like he's deeply enthralled in the story.

" _Out of the blue, beyond any cause you can trace, you'll suddenly realise things are not how you perceived them to be at all. For some reason, you will no longer be the person you believed you once were. You'll detect slow and subtle shifts going on all around you, more importantly shifts in you_."

Liam wrinkles his nose. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?" he asks.

"Shh," Brett says. "Let me finish." 

"Okay," Liam mumbles. 

" _Worse, you'll realise it's always been shifting, like a shimmer of sorts, a vast shimmer, only dark like a room. But you won't understand why or how. You'll have forgotten what granted you this awareness in the first place._ " 

Brett closes his eyes briefly, pausing. He stops, thinks to himself, _I am Brett Talbot, I am twenty one years old, and I haven't known anything for sure since I was nineteen_. 

"Brett?" Liam asks hesitantly. 

"Right. Sorry." Brett clears his throat. " _Old shelters - television, magazines, movies - won't protect you anymore. You might try scribbling in a journal, on a napkin, maybe even in the margins of this book. That's when you'll discover you no longer trust the very walls you always took for granted. Even the hallways you've walked a hundred times will feel longer, much longer, and the shadows, any shadow at all, will suddenly seem deeper, much, much deeper_."

He's about to go on, but Liam interrupts him. "Too close to home," he says nervously. "I'm not sure I wanna listen to any more of it." 

Brett nods. "Yeah. It's getting a bit too real, huh?" He bookmarks the page and puts it down; Liam goes back to whittling away at one of the stakes he's forever stockpiling. 

After a moment, he puts it aside and swallows. "Can I tell you something?"

"Sure," Brett says. 

"Just try not to freak out."

"Have you been bitten?" Brett panics. "When? We haven't been out-"

"I'm not bitten," Liam groans. "That's not what I'm getting at."

"Oh." 

Liam's chewing his fingernails, which Brett knows he only does when he's nervous or scared. "I um," he says. "I'm gay. Garrett was my boyfriend." 

Brett doesn't think he's ever been more surprised in his life. "Oh," he says. "I didn't know."

Liam shoots him an irritated look. "Obviously. I didn't tell you." 

"You have now," Brett replies, still sort of reeling. "Why?"

"You've been sharing a bed with me," Liam says. "Guess I just - I don't know. It's whatever." And fuck, Liam's doing that Liam thing where he withdraws and lashes out because he's a) hurt, b) confused, or c) both. 

He stands up. "Thought you should know," he says brusquely, "in case. I'm going out."

"No no no," Brett says firmly, reaching out to grab Liam's arm. "No. You aren't going anywhere. Sit back down." 

Liam sits back down, but he looks pretty mutinous about it.

"Liam," Brett says patiently, "I don't care that you're gay. It's not like you've just started now. You haven't come onto me or felt me up in my sleep, right? So what's the problem? You want me to go back to my own bed? I will."

"I don't," Liam stumbles, clearly flustered. "I'm not - that's not what I-"

"You don't want me to go back to my own bed?" Brett asks.

Liam shakes his head. 

"And you told me so I could make a more informed decision about how close I am with you, right?" Brett asks. "Is that why?" He smiles when Liam nods. "Well, thanks. But I enjoy sleeping with you. So if it's all the same, I'll stay." 

Liam blinks. "You'll stay?"

Brett smiles. "Yeah. I'll stay." 

~*~

Brett wakes up in the middle of the night.

Liam's sleeping soundly beside him, his back to Brett, the covers pulled up over his ears, only his hair visible. Brett reaches out, mindlessly, and clumsily palms Liam's back, feels the intense warmth radiating out from him, the rise and fall of his back with his breathing, like clockwork.

It takes him a moment to notice the aching in his chest, like a knife is twisting slowly every time he draws breath. His throat feels like it's been blasted with sandpaper. He shivers and knows there's no way, between Liam's body heat, all the blankets and the fire, that he could possibly be cold. 

He's sick. And, judging by the pain in his chest, he's got whatever killed those Keepers.

He doesn't want to, but he knows Liam needs to know. He coughs as he sits up, feels it rattle his chest. "Liam," he croaks. "Liam."

Liam stirs, rolls over, and looks at him blearily. "Brett?" he murmurs sleepily. "What's up? What time is it?"

"I don't know." Brett coughs again, covers his mouth. "Liam, you've gotta get away from me. I'm sick." 

Liam mustn't hear the first part of his sentence, because instead of moving away, he reaches out. "You're sick?" he asks uncertainly. "What with?" 

"Pneumonia." He knows, deep down, that that's exactly what it is. "I had it last year. Liam, it's contagious - you can't be near me."

"If it's contagious I've already been exposed to it." Liam's levering himself upright, climbing out of bed, and stumbling over to the table in the corner. When he comes back, he's carrying a water bottle and a thermometer. 

"Here," he says, almost collapsing back onto the bed next to Brett. "Take your temperature." 

Even while sick, Brett's fascinated by the sight of Liam's almost bare legs - he's wearing boxers and his skin is smooth and unblemished, legs muscular and defined. He doesn't seem to notice Brett looking; he's started to shiver, and his nipples are showing through his shirt.

The thermometer beeps. Liam's face drops when he reads the number.

"What is it?" Brett croaks. 

Liam hands him the water bottle. "One oh one," he mumbles. "Give or take a few decimal points." 

"That's bad," Brett says. 

Liam swallows. "What do I do?"

"Medicine." Brett's trying not to cough so he can give Liam instructions; Liam, who looks like he's on the cusp of freaking the fuck out. "I got the right stuff when you fell in the ice. Over there. Pink and white box." 

Liam retrieves it pretty fast, reads the instructions. "You're meant to have food-"

"Doesn't matter," Brett rasps. "Not right now."

Liam nods and pops out one of the tablets, hands it to him, sits back again. "Now what?" he asks nervously. 

"Come back to bed," Brett croaks. "You look cold. There's nothing else you can do right now."

Liam still looks pretty apprehensive, but he climbs back into bed and, to Brett's surprise, wraps himself around Brett until Brett's securely anchored on his side, Liam's arms around his chest and a leg slung over his hip. 

"So you don't roll onto your back," Liam mumbles.

He must be remembering the Keepers, Brett realises. How they died. The foam that came out of their mouths.

"That's not gonna happen to me," he tries to reassure Liam. "I have medicine. They didn't. We caught it early; I'm gonna be fine." 

"Whatever." Liam sounds really upset, but when Brett tries to roll over to comfort him, Liam tenses his muscles and pretty much pins Brett where he is. "Sure. Okay. Go to sleep." 

~*~

When Brett wakes up again, it's dark out still, but the fire is roaring high and Liam's shuffling around the apartment quietly, wearing and Brett's hoodie.

"Liam," Brett breathes. 

Liam looks up, startled. "Hi," he says. 

"What're you doing? It's still dark."

"It's only dark because of the snow," Liam says. "It's like nine in the morning or something. And I'm trying to make it warmer in here." Brett can see that; Liam's got the fire stoked as high as it can safely go, and there's a pot of water over it.

"My mom used to say steam helped with congestion," Liam says sheepishly. "I don't know if you're stuffed up but it can't hurt." 

"What about you?" Brett's kind of struggling to talk with the pain in his lungs. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," Liam replies, coming over to the bed and kneeling down beside it. "I've been taking my temperature every two hours." 

"Good," Brett croaks. "Smart." He reaches out and squeezes Liam's arm. "Snowing?"

"Yeah." Liam shuffles closer to him. "Yeah, the snow's really bad - it's a good thing we patched up that hole. Otherwise all the heat would be getting out. I can't really tell but I think there might be a snowstorm coming. It happened last winter as well." Brett watches as Liam turns his head; the fire throws his face into the light, and Brett sees the black circles under Liam's eyes.

"Did you sleep?" he rasps.

"A little. Not much. You were cold so I - I got up and tried to make everything warmer. Um." Liam stands up. "Now that you're awake, put a hoodie on or something. It'll keep you warm." 

Brett nods. "What happens in a snowstorm?"

"You lived in Minnesota," Liam says. "You tell me."

Brett shakes his head; Liam's pulling the hoodie off over his head. "I meant here."

"Oh." Liam's voice is muffled; he's gotten stuck in the neck of the hoodie. "I mean, we don't get snowed in, exactly, because we're above ground level, but it's pretty dark all the time and cold. But um, we should be fine. Got lots of food and purified water." He hands the hoodie to Brett. "The main thing is staying warm," he says. "Which we can do. Anyone still outside is probably dead by now."

"Like the Keepers?" Brett pulls the hoodie on; it's already warm with Liam's body heat. 

"Yeah. If they were still out there, they're probably dead." Liam leaves the bed, comes back with the antibiotics, water, and some crackers. "Eat this time?" he asks hopefully.

Brett doesn't really strictly feel like eating, but knows he should - and Liam's giving him these huge, worried puppy dog eyes that probably aren't being made on purpose, which only makes them all the more effective. So he has a few crackers and takes the pill with water, coughing in the aftermath. When he does, his chest rattles like there's loose change in there, loud and disturbing. Liam looks absolutely freaked. 

Liam settles down next to him, nervously, resting his arms on the bed. "Are you okay?" he mumbles.

"I've felt better," Brett answers honestly. "But I'll be fine, okay? Long as I keep taking the pills, I'll be fine."

Liam nods, but he still looks worried. Brett tries smiling at him.

"Come up here," he says softly. "Come back to bed."

Liam doesn't argue with him; he climbs back onto the bed and under the covers, pulling them up close and shuffling into Brett's space. When Brett reaches out to touch him, he's deliciously warm. 

Liam relaxes under his hand. He even moves a little bit closer, almost like he wants Brett to touch him. 

"Maybe you should sleep," Liam whispers.

Brett nods. He is tired, again, already, but he doesn't feel like closing his eyes and leaving Liam alone. "What'll you do?"

"Hang around. Not like I can really go anywhere, right?"

"Right," Brett mumbles. "Be safe, okay?"

"Okay." Liam shuffles closer again; his bare legs brush Brett's. "I will."

Brett dozes off to the sound of Liam rustling around in the blankets, trying to get comfortable, and his last thought is , _God, please don't let him get infected too._


	9. Chapter Nine - Desperate Times, Desperate Measures

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! And we are back with a slightly-longer-than-usual chapter from Liam's point of view ^_^ Having said that: MASSIVE trigger warnings apply to this chapter for attempted rape. Please don't read the pharmacy scene if you're triggered by this! 
> 
> Thanks to everyone who read, commented and left kudo's last time! You guys are the best :) Enjoy!

**Chapter Nine - Desperate Times, Desperate Measures**

**Liam's P.O.V**

Liam snaps awake to almost pure darkness.

His first instinct is to sigh with relief and go back to sleep. Because it hasn't been truly dark in this place for a long time - he keeps the fire burning to keep the cold away and-  
And the fire isn't burning.

His eyes snap open and he's scrambling out of bed, not bothering with a hoodie or sweats, and it's frigidly cold. The fire's low, and he could've sworn he stoked it before sleeping, but maybe it's just too cold for it to stay burning. Maybe-

"Liam?" 

Brett's voice is raspy and weak; Liam's never heard him like this, even when he first found Brett and he was on the brink of dying from starvation. "Hey," he says, frantically throwing wood on the fire.

"What's going on?"

"Nothing, everything's fine." He hisses when embers jump out at him, burning his hands and wrists. "Fuck! Everything's - the fire was running low, it almost went out." How long did he sleep for? What time is it? He can't even see daylight outside, but-

He stumbles over to the window, looks out - and sees that right up to the front door is completely snowed under. There's a tiny puddle beginning to soak into the welcome mat.  
"Fuck," Liam says, feeling his heart rate rise. "This is not good-"

"What's going on?" Brett asks again.

"Nothing!" Liam says. "No, no, don't-" Brett's trying to get out of bed; Liam leaves the doorway and pushes him back down, pulls the covers over him frantically. "Don't get up, stay in bed - I really, really need you to stay in bed."

"Why?" Brett demands weakly.

"Because we are buried in fucking snow up to our goddamn eyeballs and I need to stop it getting inside the house!" Liam yells. Okay, he's freaking out and losing his temper. "And if you drop dead because you got out of bed and froze to fucking death - that'd be a really fucking dumb way to die! So just stay there!"

"Okay," Brett croaks. "I got it. But put some more clothes on." 

"No time." Liam's gathering up old towels and rags and whatever he can find, chooses the thickest one to shove up against the base of the door. He puts bricks in front of it, turns back to the fire - at least it's running well, getting taller with every passing moment. 

He goes to the windows next, nails them shut and puts tape across them, hoping that reinforces the glass a little. In the middle of it all, he puts tea on and finds Brett's antibiotics, trying to keep himself calm.

Fucking I.E.D. He hated it before but now, unmedicated, it chooses the worst times to flare up - and yeah, Liam hasn't had an episode in a long time but the constant struggle to stay in control is exhausting, leaves him tired and vulnerable at best and crying at his worst. Today just feels like one of those days where he's gonna be bawling his eyes out.

_At least Brett might be too sick to remember_ , he thinks to himself as he hunts down more blankets. He knew there were some somewhere, but the need has never been urgent before.

He piles them on top of Brett, pops the pill out of its foil, and says desperately, "Hey. Hey, I'm sorry for yelling before, please wake up." 

"I am awake," Brett says groggily. "You're noisy."

"Right, whatever, um, you need to take another pill." Liam swallows, please not now, just a few more minutes, a couple more hours or days, and he's bargaining with a god he doesn't even believe in to please, please just let me keep my sanity this time around. Just this once, let it go my way.

Brett's got the pill on his tongue but he's not making any moves to drink, so Liam edges closer to him, and, after a moment's hesitation, gets his arm beneath Brett's head and supports his neck, holds the water bottle to his lips.

_Oh God, is he gonna die? What if he dies and turns? What am I gonna do if he dies? I can't-_

He wipes angrily at his face; his cheeks are wet. If Brett notices him crying, he doesn't say anything. Instead, he mumbles, "Is the door okay?"

Liam whips his head around to look. "Yeah," he says shakily. "Yeah, it um, it looks fine, it's okay." He wipes his face again, tries counting to ten, but finds himself counting Brett's breaths instead. "How're you feeling?" he asks.

"Been better," Brett croaks. 

"Listen, um." Liam wipes his face again, trying to gather his thoughts into some kind of coherent pattern. "Um, I need to know - I don't know how many pills to give you. How many do I give you?"

"Two week course," Brett rasps. "Three times a day." 

"Okay. Okay."

Brett's reaching out, pats Liam's bare thigh gently. His skin is covered in goosebumps, and Liam realises Brett must still be cold somehow. Even with all those blankets, and the hoodie, and the fire, he's still cold.

"It's alright," Brett murmurs. "It'll be fine. Stop worrying."

"I pathologically worry about everything!" Liam almost shouts. "I was fucking born to worry! My own mom told me that when I was nine!"

Brett laughs - weakly, and it's scratchy, but he laughs. "Whatever. Just try." 

Liam nods, gets up, and heads to the table, where he's got everything kind of piled up. Brett keeps his stuff neat, but Liam's habitually messy, and he's dumped the box of antibiotics with his hoodie and sweats.

He picks up the box, looks inside. And that's when he realises that there's only enough pills left for a few days.

He swallows, turns back to Brett, who's watching him sleepily. "So uh," he says, "what happens if you don't get the full course of antibiotics?"

"It gets worse." Brett takes a deep breath, coughing, then wincing. "The virus," he explains haltingly. "It mutates. When you take antibiotics and then don't finish them." 

Liam looks out the window. The snow is at least knee deep, the winds howling, almost nothing visible past the blisteringly white flakes of snow whipping angrily past the window.

_I have to get him more_ , he realises, feeling almost faint. _Or he could die._

He doesn't know how he's gonna do it, exactly. He wants to wait for the wind to die down, but he knows, from last year, that this storm will only get worse. He needs to get out there as soon as possible, get the medicine, and then come back. 

He swallows. Brett's not gonna let him go if Liam tells him what's going on. 

Which is why he waits until Brett's drifted fitfully into sleep before pulling on all his outerwear - feeling about twenty pounds heavier for it, too - and then rolling Brett onto his side, propping him up with pillows. He's not willing to risk Brett choking on that frothy stuff like the Keepers did.

He can't be gone long. That's the thing. Apart from it being cold out, too cold to be able to survive for very long, he can't risk leaving Brett alone. 

He's gotta get out, go to the closest pharmacy - their regular one - and hope like hell that there's more drugs there. If there's not... well, he'll cross that bridge when he comes to it. 

He's careful with the door. He doesn't want Brett to wake up to him leaving - if he wakes while Liam's gone, well, there's not a lot he can do about it, right? Unless he tries to do something dumb, like getting out of bed. 

The snow is frigidly cold, so Liam tries thinking about the nice warm Californian sun. All that does is make him miss home.

It takes longer than usual to get to the pharmacy. When he does, it's so dark inside it looks like the sun will set at any moment, even though Liam knows he's got a good few hours of daylight left. He's sweating from the effort of walking through headwinds when he gets inside.

He takes a moment to look around. The first thing he notices are the snowy footprints on the ground, partially melted.

He swallows. Someone else is here. Guess not everyone left outside is dead after all. 

Still, he can't hear any movement, even though they must've heard him come in. The tracks don't leave the store, either, so Liam knows they're still here. 

He takes a few steps forward, hesitantly. If he could just get to the storeroom and get the drugs he needs, he could be home free before the storm gets any worse. 

"Hey." 

He jumps, spins around, lifts his crossbow.

The man who spoke is much bigger than him - or Brett, Liam realises. He's about Brett's height, but much more solid, wider with a combination of muscle and fat. 

Liam licks his lips nervously. There's a blue bandana on the guy's neck. He's one of the Keepers. Except he doesn't seem to be trying to kill him yet; he's coming closer. Liam holds his crossbow up higher, a warning. 

"It's okay," the man says soothingly. His voice is cloyingly sweet. "I won't hurt you, kid." 

"Yeah. That's what they all say." Liam stands his ground, even though his instinct is to take a few steps back as the man advances slowly. "That's far enough," he growls.

The man stops. "You don't mess around, do you?"

Liam watches him warily. "Why're you here?"

"Could ask you the same thing," the man says - and follows it up with a booming, rattling cough, much worse than Brett's. 

He's sick too. Liam realises he has to get the medicine and get out of here - he's already lucky he hasn't picked anything up from Brett, and he can't afford to get sick with Brett relying on him to bring back medicine and keep him warm and safe for the next week or so. Even touching Brett is pushing his luck; he's not exposing himself further.

"Sounds pretty bad," he comments.

The man shrugs. "We all got a bit of it right now, don't we?" he asks. Liam surveys him calmly - this guy is huge, no argument there. But he also looks distinctly unsteady on his feet, and if he's a Keeper, Liam's willing to bet he's probably weak from exposure as well as the pneumonia. That he even revealed himself when Liam is clearly armed to the teeth is pretty telling.

"Yeah," Liam answers finally.

The man's looking around. "You alone?" 

"No," Liam lies. His voice comes out steady. "No, I've got a few friends around." 

"Uh huh." The man doesn't believe him; he's edging closer. "So where are they, then?"

Liam stays quiet. The best lie is one without details. He'd never give up where any of his friends were if he did have some around, so this doesn't feel like too much of a stretch for him. 

"Hey," he snaps. "I said that's far enough."

"You," the man coughs, "seem just fine."

Liam doesn't answer that, either. Finally, he does say, "Look. We're part of a scouting party. We need medicine. I'll split everything with you if you just let me get out of here." 

The man smiles. "They sent a teenager on a scouting party, huh?" he asks. "Sure. I believe that. And who's they? Because as far as I know, there's no one in this area."

"As far as I know," Liam says icily, "Keepers don't exactly wander out this far either. You're in our territory. Back off." _Brett couldn't tell how old I was_ , Liam thinks, confused. _This guy can. I really need facial hair._

"Look," he says. "I need to get back. Take what you need. I honestly don't care." 

The man smiles. "I'm not out here looking for medicine," he says. 

"Yeah?" Liam asks coldly. "Well, I don't have anything else to give you."

He's still smiling. And then it clicks for Liam, suddenly - this man doesn't want food, or medicine, or water. He's not interested in negotiating. Liam doesn't know how he can tell, exactly, but suddenly the reason the man hasn't killed him yet - even though he's a Keeper - makes perfect, cold, logical sense to him. 

Liam feels like someone's doused him with icy water. Because he's just realised he's cornered in a shop with a man who clearly wants to hurt him and can't leave, because he needs those tablets for Brett. 

"Kid," the man says, "I really suggest you just give it up. I know you're alone. And you wouldn't believe the things I've done just to survive." 

"Fuck you," Liam spits, and fires his crossbow.

The bolt buries itself in the man's shoulder - Liam's not trying to kill him, just deter him - and he bellows with agony. Liam's knocking another bolt when the man rips the first one out, mindless of the blood pouring everywhere, and charges him.

Liam drops the pack and crossbow immediately, heads for the knife in his boot, but he's caught off guard before he can get there - the guy's shoulder hits his chest, and he's winded, breathless, kicking and struggling as he's lifted bodily off the ground and slammed into a shelving unit behind him.

His shoulder explodes in pain, and his head is ringing frantically. Before he can gather himself to struggle again, the guy's got him down on his knees, his larger frame curled around Liam, a knife near his throat.

"Hold still," he murmurs. "I'm not going to kill you just yet." 

Liam takes a moment, trying to clear the panic from his head even as he hears the zipper of jeans being unzipped, the clink of a belt buckle. He's trying to assess how strong the guy actually is - and his grip, Liam finds, is fairly weak. 

"That's it," the man murmurs. "Just hold still."

Liam wrenches his body sideways with everything he's got and successfully dislodges most of his body from the man's grip. He doesn't get away fast enough to avoid the knife, though - it comes towards his chest and he turns, ducks, feels it ripping into the flesh of his left arm. The pain barely registers past the adrenaline pumping through him. 

He scrambles away, gets his hand around the knife in his boot. He wants to make it back to his crossbow, hopefully put a bolt in both the guy's legs so he can't walk, but he doesn't get a chance. 

He opens his mouth to yell a warning or something as he sees the zombie come up behind the guy, but it's too late and Liam's not sure he wants to warn him anyway. The zombie grabs the guy, sinks its teeth into his shoulder, and rips. 

Liam's never seen anyone mauled this close. He's still backing away, sliding himself across the floor, listening to his would-be rapist bellow in agony and turn, about to bury the knife in the zombie's head. He isn't fast enough; the zombie takes the opportunity to take a chunk out of his neck as well.

Liam flinches; there's blood spraying everywhere and the guy's screams are echoing around in his skull, even as Liam watches him knife the zombie in the head and collapse like a sack of bricks. 

He's got a hand clamped over his neck; Liam's back hits the shelving unit, alerting the man to his position. He turns his head.

Liam stares as the guy reaches out for him. For help. But he's bitten, and Liam knows there's nothing he can do about that. 

_You could put him down_ , a voice in his head says. _Save him the pain of bleeding to death._

But he doesn't want to.

He sits there and watches, stunned and scared, as the man bleeds to death. He watches as his eyes close and he stops breathing. 

He sits there for a while. Shaking, petrified, too afraid to move. He knows he has to get up - there might be more zombies around - but his body is still stuck in the struggle they just had, while his mind is trying to process the intent behind it. 

Liam swallows. Then, slowly, he starts to sit up.

_Get up_. The list starts forming slowly in his head, like bullet points on a whiteboard. _Get back. Get Brett the medicine. Make everything warm. Check yourself out. Eat. Rest._

He swallows. When he looks at it like that, it seems like a lot of fucking stuff to get done - so much that it's daunting. He's gone so long without having to think about anything that now he doesn't know what to do. 

_You can't stay here. Brett needs you. Get up._

_Like Garrett needed you. At least don't let Brett down as well._

He feels tears prick his eyes. He brushes them away, telling himself he can cry once he's home. There's already too much fucking water and ice out here for him to be contributing to it.

He starts to get to his feet, slowly, trying to assess the damage in his arm. The knife has cut him pretty badly on his bicep, and he's bleeding, but the muscular pain on his shoulder blade is what's worrying him more. The cut will heal; he barely has any range of movement in his shoulder.

Once he's upright, the world spins for almost thirty seconds before it rightens reluctantly. He blinks to clear his vision, picks his things up. He goes to the body of the Keeper, staggering a little. 

_Loot the body_. He's not sure why it's Brett's voice in his head, but he goes with it. _Loot the body. Put him down properly. Get out of here. Get back to Brett._

He kneels down and knifes the guy in the head, just to make sure he isn't one of the ones who reanimates really fucking quickly.

He manages to loot a fair bit of food off the guy, a gun, two knives. He finds a med kit in his pack, takes that too. Anything could be useful. He shoves it all into his bag, stands up, tries to keep his footing steady.

_Your blood sugar's low. Eat something. Get the medicine. Get back to Brett._

He takes out the antibiotic box for reference, heads towards the back of the store. He's trying to remember why Brett didn't loot everything the first time around, but the answer's eluding him somehow.

_Did I hit my head as well?_

He finds the pills. There's dozens of boxes of them; Liam sweeps them all into his backpack. Then, just because, he pilfers a whole bunch of Codeine tablets, some Ventolin, other crap he doesn't even know the name of. Brett will understand it all when he's better. 

He pauses briefly before he leaves to try and assess the damage to his arm, but he can't see properly and he can't risk taking his jacket off, not with the cold. He can feel his blood running down his arm, though, knows he hasn't stopped bleeding even if it has slowed down.

He's barely mindful of the weather before he steps outside the store - it's worse than before. But there's no choice; he has to get home, get Brett his pills. Do whatever it takes to survive, as per usual. This is how things work now. And he'll factor the way that guy looked at him - what he wanted from him - into that as well.

_There are predators everywhere_ , he thinks hazily as he trudges through the snow. _You're seventeen years old and they want way more than just your food or your weapons. This is how things work now._

_Brett's not like that. Brett's never been like that._

The last thought only steels his resolve more, and he picks up the pace a little, following his prints all the way to the front door. He's feeling pretty sluggish by the time he gets there. 

_How much blood did I lose?_

He can't hold onto his thoughts; they're flittering away like butterflies in the summer, always just out of reach, impossible to catch. Fragile, fleeting things. 

He staggers inside, shuts the door behind him. The first thing he does is dump the backpack. Then he's stumbling over to the table, grabbing Brett's antibiotics and a water bottle, and heading back to the bed.

Brett's wheezing worse than before; the rattle is becoming a permanent feature of his breathing. "Brett," Liam breathes. "Brett, wake up. You need to take your fucking tablet."   
Brett groans incoherently.

"Please," Liam begs, his voice cracking.

But Brett doesn't open his mouth. And Liam doesn't know how to wake him up properly, so he stands, hesitating before he props Brett's jaw open and pushes the pill between his lips, then holds water to his mouth, lets some trickle in.

He's about to start rubbing Brett's throat to try and get him to swallow when Brett does it on his own, and Liam almost slumps to the ground with relief. 

Get back. Get Brett his medicine. Check. 

He tries to prioritise the list of things he has to do. His arm. He needs to do something about his arm. 

He heads to the fire, drags his pack closer. Then, slowly, painfully, he starts stripping out of his jacket, his scarf. The whole process burns and aches like a fucking bitch, and he has to stop a few times just so he doesn't bite through his own lip, but he gets down to his t-shirt eventually. 

_Get it clean, Liam. You know the drill. Clean it, disinfect it, bandage it. Same shit, different day._

He uses a wet rag to clean the blood off. The cut looks pretty bad - it could probably do with stitching up but he doesn't know how to do that, especially not on his own bicep with his right hand. So he cleans it up, best he can, then starts dumping disinfectant on it. 

It burns like someone's rubbing salt in it - or acid. Liam grits his teeth against the pain even as his eyes start streaming of their own accord. He realises he can't work around his t-shirt sleeve, so he rips it off, then starts to bandage it clumsily. He gets the gauze pad on it, then all the bandages, and then all the tape.

He's still worried about his shoulder, how badly it hurts. But he can't do anything about it right now.

Food. He's gotta get food. 

He goes straight for the deer meat, because he knows he needs protein, sits as close to the fire as he can. He's trying to count Brett's breaths, but they're unsteady, and it's freaking him out. So instead he starts taking inventory on what he's looted from the Keeper.

A medkit with bandages and gauze pads. Two bottles of Tylenol. And, underneath that, when he digs deeper, vials of drugs and needles. He doesn't investigate further.

Brett's antibiotics. He puts them aside to count later. At least half a dozen bottles of Codeine. Five Ventolin inhalers. Ten cans of food. Dried meat. The gun and two knives.   
Not too shabby. He sits back, then remembers to block the door properly with towels and bricks. And he's feeling sort of better. Steadier.

He takes a long, shaky breath in, lets it out. Then, slowly, he leans over and picks up his jacket. It's got a tear in the arm, but he can patch that up if he can get the blood out.  
Seeing as Brett's sleeping easily and there's nothing else to do, Liam sets to work cleaning the blood out of his clothes. It takes a while, but eventually they're stain-free - the blood didn't have time to dry, which makes it easier to get everything out. 

Next is the stitching - but his hands are still kind of shaky, so he gives that up after a while. He puts it aside to do later, counts Brett's pills out, then gets up and ambles over to the bed, setting a timer on their watch.

He's tired. He puts his arms and head on the mattress next to Brett's arm, closes his eyes. He doesn't want to get up onto the bed in case he squirms and wakes Brett up, and besides, he'd probably get blood on the sheets.

"Hey," he mumbles at Brett. "Feel better, okay?" 

Brett sighs.

"Okay," Liam mumbles. Then he's out.

~*~

He wakes up to wind.

His first thought is that one of the windows has blown in, but when he really opens his eyes, he realises it's just really fucking loud outside. 

He checks the timer groggily. Still an hour to go until Brett needs another pill, which means he's only slept four. It's not nearly enough; he feels worse than he did before he went to sleep. His arm is throbbing viciously, and his shoulder feels less like a body part and more like a punishment. 

He dozes a bit more. The alarm wakes him up; he stands, on autopilot, and gets a tablet and some water, shakes Brett's shoulder tiredly.

"Brett," he mumbles. "Tablet."

Brett actually opens his mouth willingly, murmuring, "Liam?" questioningly.

"Yeah. It's me." Liam tips some water into his mouth; Brett strains his neck up like he wants more, so Liam keeps going. "How're you feeling?"

"Shit," Brett croaks.

"Yeah. Me too." Liam puts the bottle aside. "Do you need anything?" he asks sleepily.

Brett shakes his head.

"Okay." Liam resets the timer. "Go back to sleep." 

~*~

This time, it's the alarm that wakes him.

Brett's already awake; he's looking at Liam as Liam lifts his head tiredly. "Hey," Liam croaks, rubbing his eyes and trying to seem more alert than what he actually is. "You should've woken me up."

"You seemed like you needed it." Brett's voice is still croaky, but he sounds a little better. "Why aren't you in bed?"

"You hog the covers," Liam answers, deflecting from the real reason. He helps Brett take his tablet, then gets up and staggers over to the fire, sits down, starts throwing more wood onto it. "How're you feeling?"

"Much better. Still kinda crappy, but not like I'm gonna choke to death."

Liam tries to smile, because he really is happy. His expedition was worth it, then. "Good," he says. "That's good." He makes to lift another log with his injured arm, winces, and puts it back down.

"You okay?" Brett asks slowly.

"Hmm?"

"You flinched."

"I'm okay," Liam says, hoping he doesn't ask again. He won't be able to lie the next time, just because he can't be bothered expending the energy. "How's your chest?"

Brett touches it like he's forgotten he's sick. "It's been better," he admits ruefully. 

"You want some Tylenol?" Liam asks.

"Where'd you get Tylenol?" Brett asks slowly. 

Liam winces. They didn't have any before; he was talking about the stuff from the medkit. "Found it," he lies feebly. "It'd just fallen."

There's a long pause. Brett doesn't buy it. Liam doesn't blame him; it doesn't sound very convincing, even to him. 

"They'd fallen," Brett says slowly. "And you mean to tell me that you didn't ransack the place for them the moment you realised they were gone?"

Liam winces again. "Uh... I forgot." He stands up, wanting to put another hoodie on - he's cold - and retrieves one, sitting back down. He gets one arm into it, his right arm, but he can't get his left arm to cooperate between the sharp pain of the cut and the aching, persistent pain of his shoulder. 

Brett stares at him. "You're hurt," he says slowly. "When did you get hurt?"

"Yesterday." Liam moves his pack gingerly. He's too tired and sore to pretend he isn't injured; his arm is still bleeding slowly and he doesn't even want to look at his back.

"Yesterday?" Brett demands. "What the hell were you doing yesterday?"

"I went out," Liam says. "You were running out of pills. There weren't enough for you to take a full course. So I went out and got more. Turns out not everyone outside is dead. Ran into a Keeper. I wanted it more than him I guess." 

"You went out in a fucking snowstorm?" Brett demands.

"I didn't have a choice." Liam wants that to come out angry and bitter, but it doesn't. It comes out desperately, like he's begging Brett to understand him, to not be angry at him. "You were sick, we didn't have the drugs we needed, you wouldn't wake up, I didn't know what to do so I - I went and got you more medicine." 

There's a long silence. Liam sighs shakily, beginning to try and stand up, but the world spins a little. Brett looks alarmed when he sits back down.

He gets up, heads over to Liam, kneels down in front of him. "Where are you hurt?" he asks softly.

"My arm." Liam swallows. "Shoulder."

"Show me?"

It's a request. Liam unzips his hoodie, begins to try and get out of it with minimal effort. Brett helps him slide out of it. 

"Jesus, Liam," he breathes. "What-"

"He had a knife," Liam says tiredly. "He got me pretty good."

Brett's peeling back the bandages. They're red with Liam's blood, which is still weeping, very slowly, out of the open wound. "You need stitches," he says. "Right now. And some food."

"I'm not good with needles."

"You're about to get some practice." Brett's ruffling around in the stolen medkit. "Hold still, okay?" he asks as he holds the needle over the fire. 

"My shoulder feels worse." Liam hisses as he feels the needle going in. "I'm really worried about it. I can barely move it."

"I'll check that out next."

"You should be in bed," Liam rebukes weakly.

"I'm feeling much better, thanks to you." Brett's already halfway down the cut. "How'd this happen? He fight you for the medicine?"

"He didn't give a shit about any of that," Liam says. "Or my food or my crossbow. Should've seen him. I offered to split everything just to get away but the moment he saw me..." Liam swallows, remembering the predatory look in the man's eyes. "The moment he realised I was alone, I knew that wasn't gonna work," Liam admits. "He didn't want anything I was willing to give up." 

Brett stops what he's doing for a long moment. Then, after a while, he says quietly, "Is this the only place you're hurt?"

Liam closes his eyes. "Yes."

"Is he still alive?"

"No."

"Good." Brett's tying off the stitches and patching him up again. "So, your-"

"Can you just," Liam says, and his voice breaks. "Can you just give me a minute?" 

"Liam," Brett whispers. "He didn't-"

"He didn't fucking do anything," Liam snaps wetly. "Alright? And it wasn't for lack of trying, either, so if you could just - give me just one fucking minute to process the fact that some fifty-year-old paedophile was about to violently rape and probably murder me, that would be fucking lovely."

Brett makes this shocked, awful breathy noise when Liam's done. Then he's moving in close and wrapping Liam up in his arms, securely, tightly, being mindful of his shoulder and his cut. 

Liam clenches his jaw, squeezes his eyes shut desperately, and holds on with his good arm. He doesn't want to cry - doesn't want to give that sick fucker the pleasure, even posthumously, of making him scared. But the tears are slipping out no matter what he does, and there's sobs building up in his chest.

The first one is so painful it could break him in half, and he hasn't cried like this since he had to put Garrett down. He's shaking and it feels like the only thing that's holding him together is the cage of Brett's arms around him. And when that first sob breaks, Brett holds him tighter, murmuring strange half-sentences into his ear and stroking the back of Liam's head. 

He only lasts for about two minutes like that before he's dried up, his head aching and eyes sore. He sniffles a little. 

Brett coughs hard beneath him, suddenly, and Liam pulls away from him gently. "I'm sorry," he croaks, his voice thick and crackling from the crying. "You're really sick, I shouldn't be-"

Brett's already shaking his head, so Liam stops. Brett's wiping Liam's face gently with his sleeves, trying to be careful of the puffiness under his eyes.

"Come back to bed," Brett says quietly.

"I need to do stuff," Liam protests. "Your medicine, and food, and-"

"And it can all wait," Brett says. "You're fucking exhausted, Liam. When was the last time you slept properly? Come on. Come to bed. Set a timer for my drugs or something." Brett nods encouragingly. "Eat something," he says quietly. "Have a drink of water. Then come lie down with me. You don't have to sleep. Just rest." 

He does what he's told - he makes them both some soup and takes Brett his in bed, sits on the edge of the mattress and eats almost mechanically. Brett finishes before him, and he puts a hand on Liam's knee, like he's trying to reassure him that he's there.

Liam appreciates the effort. He knows he makes it hard for people to get close to him. That Brett even still tries is nothing short of a fucking miracle.

Eventually, when he's done eating, he gets them both some tea, then starts to wriggle slowly out of his jeans, using his good hand to push them down. He isn't worried about climbing into bed with Brett half-naked. Brett couldn't defeat a kitten right now anyway.

He sets the timer on their watch and puts it next to his pillow, then lies on his good side to look at Brett. Brett's breathing is still pretty harsh and rattling, and he sounds like he's having trouble taking deep breaths. 

"Should've found an oxygen tank as well," Liam says blankly. "Old man."

Brett laughs a little, breathlessly. "I'm alright."

Liam closes his eyes; he is pretty tired. "Wake me up if you need anything?" he mumbles. 

"I will," Brett says. "Now get some rest, okay?"

"Mmm."

~*~

Liam wakes up because the timer's beeping quietly.

He opens his eyes, only to be met with a wall that says DES MOINES '96 on it. He blinks, because he can't remember where he is.

Then the wall moves, and he realises he's on his side, has his face buried in Brett's chest. Brett's arms are looped loosely around his shoulders.

He sits up, causing Brett to wheeze a little bit. "Brett," he mumbles, shaking his shoulder. "Brett, you gotta take your tablet." He stumbles out of bed, pulling a pair of sweats on; his arm still hurts, but not as badly. His shoulder is a different story; it's killing him. "Fuck," he groans. 

He gets to the table, picks up the pills and makes his way back to the bed. Brett's still on his side. He doesn't seem to have stirred.

"Brett, come on," Liam groans, shaking his shoulder again. "I'm not fucking around." 

Brett rolls completely over, onto his other side, so he's facing Liam. "I'm gonna be sick," he moans.

Liam doesn't bother questioning him; he lunges for a bucket and just gets it under Brett's face in time. He wants to take Brett's temperature, because vomiting feels like it's probably a step back on the scale of getting better, but he can't with Brett like this. All he can really do is hold the bucket and touch Brett's shoulder, hesitantly, aiming for the soothing action Brett seems to have taken up where he's concerned. 

_He got worse while I was sleeping._ Liam wonders if there's a way to avoid the crashing waves of guilt over that. Probably not.

Brett eventually stops, and Liam empties the bucket out of the back window. When he comes back, Brett's watching the doorway where he exited.

He settles down next to the bed, wet cloth in hand, and wipes Brett's face gently. He moves down to his neck, too, and collarbones. Brett's shivering, but he feels about a thousand degrees.

"You're really gentle," Brett croaks. 

Liam smiles a little. Then he hands over Brett's tablet. "Can you take this?"

"Yeah." Brett swallows the pill, and Liam goes back to what he was doing. If this is the only thing he can do right now, he'll do it. 

He's about to get the thermometer when Brett snags the shoulder of his hoodie in his hand. "Liam," he murmurs. "Hey. Listen to me."

Liam settles back in, his eyes on Brett. 

"If I don't get better in three days," Brett croaks, "you need to go. Okay? If I'm not getting better in three days, you need to pack up and get out of the city."

"I'm not leaving you," Liam says. 

"Liam." Brett holds onto him tighter. "You aren't listening-"

"I'm listening just fine," Liam says. "I'm just refusing."

"You don't understand." Brett's breathing sounds awful. "After three days, the lungs," he pants, "they start to fail. That white stuff - around the Keepers. That was liquefied lung tissue." 

Liam keeps his face impassive, even though he's sort of thinking _oh God what the fuck_ at a pretty loud, high-pitched volume in his head. "So?" he asks. "I haven't caught it yet." 

"It becomes airborne once that happens," Brett croaks, "and you could get infected from that, okay? That's what - happened last winter. Bunch of people - they resisted the contact form. But once people - started to choke up that stuff - they got sick." 

Liam wants to yell. Something along the lines of _you fucker, you came into my fucking city and made yourself my problem and now you're gonna die on me, you prick_ would probably cover it. But he's trying to be a better, calmer person and all that shit. 

He shuffles closer to Brett, puts a hand on his neck. "I'm not leaving you," he murmurs. "Okay? You stuck by me through everything. And I'm not going anywhere. You can stop talking about it now. You're not going to change my mind." 

Brett smiles weakly. "You're stupidly loyal." 

"I think that might've been a backhanded compliment, so thanks." Liam sits up properly. "Do you need anything?" 

"What've we got?" 

Liam turns to the table. "I think we've got some Tylenol," he says. "If your chest hurts. And I lifted some Ventolin. It's for breathing problems, right?"

"Let's try both."

Liam knows Brett's gotta be bad if he's asking for both. He wants to take something for his shoulder but Brett needs the pills more, and he's not sure how much they've got left. Maybe later.

He heads back, gives Brett the Tylenol, and helps him drink. Then he takes the Ventolin out of the package and begins assembling the plastic pieces.

"You're asthmatic?" Brett asks.

"Garrett was," Liam says quietly. "Here." He shakes the inhaler, puts it in Brett's mouth, and presses on the canister as Brett inhales. 

"Okay," Liam says. "Want something to drink?" 

~*~

For the next day, Brett pretty much sleeps. 

He's awake sometimes, chatters with Liam a little, but mostly Liam's the one doing the talking, which feels weird. He takes his pills, drinks, sometimes even eats some crackers.  
Liam takes his own temperature every two hours, but it stays steady. Somehow, he's avoided catching this thing, even though the Keeper he fought with at the chemist clearly had it as well. He thanks his immune system profusely every day. 

He tries not to think too hard about that Keeper. About what would've happened if he'd tried peaceful negotiations with him. It's weird, though, to think that Brett's sick, barely able to lift his head to drink water - and Liam still feels safe here, protected. Like Brett won't let anything like that happen to him. Maybe that's why he's handling it so well.

Brett doesn't improve on the second day, but he doesn't backslide either. By the third day, he's starting to sit up. The cough is still there, but it doesn't stop Brett from breathing like it used to.

"So," Liam says, on the third day. He's sitting on the bed; he and Brett are playing Uno, of all things. "Guess your little speech about leaving you was unneeded."

Brett smiles tiredly. "Well, hindsight's always twenty-twenty, smartass."

"What the fuck does that mean?" Liam grumbles, incensed when he has to draw four cards. "Asshole." 

"It means you always have clear vision when you're looking back," Brett says. "Because you can see the effect all your past decisions have had on the present." He follows Liam's red seven with a draw two. "Read 'em and weep."

"Yeah, I hope your twenty-twenty vision is working pretty well when you're trying to figure out why I didn't feed you tonight," Liam mutters, and Brett laughs. 

"Should I let you win?"

"I don't want you to let me win," Liam grumbles, throwing down a draw four of his own. "I want to win of my own accord."

"Ah, you're one of those people." Brett stops to cough, and Liam pauses what he's doing, looking at Brett. Eventually, he puts his cards down and scoots round the mattress so he can rub Brett's back for him. 

Brett's breathing heavily when he's done. Liam lets him lean back against his chest, then reaches around and folds Brett's hand down so he can't see his cards.

"You're so honourable," Brett wheezes.

"I wanna win a fair fight." Liam reaches over and grabs the Ventolin. "Here." 

Brett takes a few puffs of it. "Hey," he breathes. "How's your shoulder and arm?"

"They're okay. Shoulder's a bit tender." 

"I never patched it up," Brett says. "Have you just been walking around in pain?"

"You were too sick," Liam says, avoiding the second question entirely - mostly because the answer is a pretty solid yes. 

Brett's coughing again anyway. Liam holds him, pats his back, closes his eyes and prays this round is over soon. It doesn't seem to last as long as the first one, at least. 

When it's over, he moves around to Brett's front and gives him some water. Then, unthinkingly, he leans down and presses a kiss against his forehead.

He realises, pretty much straight away, what he's done, and Brett seems to know Liam's about to have a meltdown, because he grabs Liam before he can even really start pulling away. "Fuck," Liam stammers. "I'm really sorry."

"Don't be," Brett says. "It was nice." 

"I just - I didn't mean to do it, I-" _I would've done it for Garrett._

"Liam, it's okay," Brett says, smiling a little. "Kiss my forehead all you want. I like it." 

Liam swallows. "Yeah. Okay." 

Brett lifts his cards and smiles at him, evidently waiting for Liam to join the game again. So he does, because he'd rather ignore what just happened. His cheeks feel hot; he knows he's blushing furiously, so he raises his cards to his face to try and hide it. 

"Liam," Brett chuckles. "Stop being so fucking cute and play a card."

Liam resigns himself to the fact that Brett knows he's blushing - twice as much now that Brett's just called him cute - and lowers his hand, tossing a green eight on the deck.

Brett picks it up, hands it back to him. "Colour's red, Li," he says, almost apologetically. 

"Oh," Liam mumbles, and picks up a card. "Your turn." 

Brett puts his cards down, face up. Liam looks at him indignantly.

"Dude. What the fuck? I was winning."

"You have seventeen cards in your hand," Brett says disbelievingly. "I had three. You must be delusional."

"I was gonna win!" Liam insists, but puts his cards down anyway. Brett snorts when he sees Liam's hand.

"Yeah. Totally." He looks serious again, though, and Liam groans, knowing he's about to become a very unwilling participant in a serious conversation. 

"Liam," he says quietly. "What... happened with that Keeper?"

Liam swallows. "I don't wanna talk about that," he says uncomfortably.

Brett looks pretty worked up, though. "All you said was that he didn't get what he wanted," Brett says. "Which doesn't mean he didn't hurt you. What happened?" 

"I was going into the storeroom," Liam says. "I got halfway across the store when I realised there was someone else in there - fresh snow prints, you know? Puddles of water in boot shapes. He must've seen me before I saw him, because he was watching when I turned around." Liam shakes his head. "I pointed my crossbow at him, just to make sure he knew I wasn't a pushover. Asked him what he wanted. He asked me the same thing."

"But things must've escalated, right?" Brett asks.

"Yeah. They did. I told him he could have half the medicine if he just let me go on my way peacefully, but he wasn't having any of that." Liam swallows, hard, trying not to think too much about what happened next. "He got the upper hand. Big dude. Strong, even though he was infected with whatever you have. He had a knife, but he wasn't holding me tight enough, so I managed to get away. That's when he cut me." Liam motions to his arm. 

"You killed him?" Brett asks softly.

"No!" Liam snaps. "I didn't fucking kill him. There was a zombie - it must've been dormant until we started making noise. Took a huge chunk out of his shoulder and neck. He managed to put it down but he bled out." Liam swallows. "I watched."

"Liam-"

"I should've been more careful," Liam says. "And I should've helped him - should've, I don't know, tried to stop the bleeding, but he was bit, and I didn't - I didn't want to help him."

"He didn't deserve help," Brett says. "It wasn't your fault." He sits up properly. "Let me see your shoulder." 

Liam starts pulling layers off until he's reached his t-shirt, takes that off as well. Brett hisses.

"Is it that bad?" Liam asks hesitantly.

"You look like you went two rounds with a fucking grizzly," Brett says shakily. "Jesus Christ. I've never seen bruising that bad. You've gotta be in pain."

"A little."

"A little?" Brett's hands are stroking the area. "Liam, I'm sorry. I dunno if there's much I can do about this. I can't massage it or anything..."

"It's okay," Liam says quickly. "Just - it'll be fine, right? I mean, it's my left arm, I kind of need it to shoot."

"I think it'll be fine," Brett murmurs. He turns Liam around. "But I'm more worried about... what almost happened."

"I told you," Liam says. "I don't-"

"Want to talk about it." Brett nods. "I know. I just... are you okay? No nightmares or anything?"

Liam shakes his head. "No," he says quietly. "No nightmares. I've got you here. There's that. I feel okay, mostly."

"Me?" Brett wonders aloud. "What've I got to do with it?"

"I feel safer with you around," Liam says, and decides that he's not going to run from that confession; it's true. He starts shuffling the cards, aware that Brett's staring at him. "One more game?" 

"Come here," Brett says, ignoring him.

Liam snuffles over. "What's wrong?" he asks. "You need some more Ventolin?"

But Brett's wrapping him up in a hug, sighing, looking like he's not gonna let go anytime soon. Liam blinks a little.

"Brett?"

"Yeah."

"What're you doing?"

"Hugging you." 

Liam settles down into the hug, readjusting so he's more comfortable. When Brett coughs, he rubs his back absently with both hands. 

He sighs, settles in, and lets Brett put his chin on the top of his head. They stay like that for a few minutes; Liam almost dozes off until Brett moves.

He pulls back, smiles, and looks at Liam, touching his face. "I'm glad you're okay." 

"Yeah." Liam smiles back, a little. "Me too." 

~*~

He wakes up because Brett's shaking him frantically.

He opens his eyes, disoriented, his gaze landing on Brett almost straight away. "Yeah?" he croaks.

Brett looks relieved. "You were having a nightmare," he says shakily. "I thought there was a dying animal outside or something when I woke up." He's smoothing Liam's hair back from his forehead. "You okay?" he asks hesitantly.

Liam swallows. "I think so. I don't remember what I was dreaming about. But I can probably take a good guess." He rubs his eyes. "How're you doing?"

"Good. Better. Still kind of wheezy." Brett's still leaning over him. "You were holding your neck."

Liam shuts his eyes. "I'm never gonna forget that," he murmurs. "Ever. I've never seen anyone get mauled that up close and personal before... he was only a few feet from me."   
"I'm sorry you had to see it," Brett says softly.

Liam shakes his head. "It could've been much worse. If that zombie hadn't come when it did I-"

His throat closes over. Brett doesn't say anything, and Liam attempts to get control of his voicebox again. The words are there, but he can't seem to spit them out.

"It's okay," Brett says eventually. "I know." He lies down, and Liam shuffles over until his head is under Brett's arm, face pressed to his ribcage. 

Brett laughs softly. "That's your favourite spot, huh?"

"Yeah." He doesn't see the point in lying. "Are you sure you're feeling okay?"

"Yeah, Li. I am." Brett's arm squeezes him awkwardly. "Seriously. Thank you. You saved my life... again."

"Didn't do it so you'd owe me," Liam jokes, and Brett laughs. 

"Yeah. Whatever. Get some sleep, okay? I'll wake you up if you have any more dreams."

"Okay. Night." 

"Night."


	10. Chapter Ten: Heart To Heart

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahhh, you guys. You're amazing. Thank you SO MUCH for the positive response to the last chapter - I was pretty nervous about posting it. Also, I see some new names in there! Welcome to the world of Briam ^_^ Enjoy the chapter, guys!

**Chapter Ten - Heart To Heart**

"Ah, fuck."

Brett opens his eyes to Liam's cranky grumbling. At first, he thinks something is seriously wrong - just from the words - until he realises that Liam's attempting to stitch up a hole in his jacket.

"Hey," he croaks, and then coughs.

"Hi," Liam says, abandoning the jacket and coming over to him. "You've been asleep for ages."

"Really?"

"Yeah. At least nine hours I reckon." Liam shrugs. "I got you to take your pill, but you didn't really wake up for it." Liam reaches over and grabs the water bottle. "Have some water?" he asks hopefully.

Brett smiles, sits up, and takes the bottle. "Thanks. What've you been doing?"

"Nothing, really," Liam says. "I slept a little. Chopped up some firewood in the next room. Purified water. You know. All the basic shit." Brett knows, by looking at him, that "slept a little" means, "caught a few minutes" because the bags under Liam's eyes are deep and bruised, and his eyes themselves are exhausted and bloodshot.

"Sorry I haven't been able to help," Brett says guiltily. "Your arm..."

Liam's holding it strangely, like it's still hurting him. "It's fine," he says quickly. "The cut feels much better. And my shoulder isn't as bad." He moves to sit on the edge of the bed with Brett, smiling almost shyly. "You did a good job stitching me up," he says. "It's already healing."

"Yeah? Can I see?"

Liam pulls his hoodie off gingerly and pulls up the sleeve of his t-shirt. Sure enough, the cut looks much better, and, like Liam said, like it's healing.

"That's good," Brett says. "You're lucky it didn't get infected."

"I disinfected it as soon as I got back," Liam says.

Brett raises an eyebrow. "That had to hurt."

Liam's heading back over to the fire; he comes back with a bowl of oatmeal. "Kind of. But it's not like I had a choice or anything." He hands the bowl to Brett. "Made you this," he says. "You should eat something. Something that isn't a cracker."

"You're probably right." Brett surveys Liam; he seems much steadier than he was the last time Brett was awake, much more put together. Tired, though, bordering on exhausted. "You seem..."

Liam looks up at him, looking like a deer caught in a set of headlights, his eyes wide, expression stripped bare. "... Better?" he finishes uncertainly for Brett.

"Yeah. Better." Brett reaches out to stroke Liam's shoulder. "I hope you aren't... thinking about it too much." 

Liam gives him an apprehensive little smile. "I'm trying not to," he says. "It's fine. I've got it all under control up here." He taps his head. 

"Okay. Well, if you need anything..."

"I'll let you know," Liam says. 

"Will you?" Brett asks, surprised.

Liam nods, and Brett knows he's being honest. Liam seems to have given up lying to him, or hiding how he's feeling, for the most part. More surprisingly, he hasn't run away from Brett or any hard conversations. 

Even as Brett sits there and eats, Liam edges closer to him. Brett tries to hide his smile. He's pretty much worked out that Liam's actually pretty affectionate, everything considered; he enjoys sitting close and even willingly snuggles up to Brett at night, though Brett's not sure that will continue when summer hits. 

"What'd you think of me?" Brett asks. "The first time you saw me, that is." 

"Honestly?" Liam asks.

"Yeah."

"I thought you were a fucking idiot." 

Brett laughs. "How Liam of you."

"You were wandering around, outside, no water, no food, no weapon," Liam says, "no way to make a fire, heading straight for a herd." He leans forward and steals a bite of Brett's oatmeal. "But, um," he says quietly, and Brett realises he's blushing. "I also thought you were pretty hot."

Brett laughs. "Yeah?"

"Yeah." Liam's starting to look a little wounded. "Is that... is that funny?"

"No," Brett says, trying to stop. "Not really. I just - I'm really flattered, thank you. Even starving to death, I'm attractive. Apparently." 

Liam smiles, yawns, covers his mouth, but maintains eye contact with Brett the whole time. He's looking kind of skinny, Brett realises, and wonders belatedly if they're running low on food, or whether Liam's just not eating very well right now.

"What'd you think of me?" Liam asks curiously. 

"I was scared of you," Brett admits.

"How brave," Liam says. "You? Scared of me?" 

"You're pretty scary when you're angry."

Liam shrugs. "It's an illusion. I've already told you I was never gonna hurt you. Well, much. Sorry about the knock over the head." 

"I forgive you. This time." Liam's edged close enough to be pressed against Brett's side; Brett's slumped, so his head is level with Liam's chest. 

"You think you're so sneaky, don't you?" he asks. "Shuffling closer while I'm not paying attention."

Liam blushes, but the corners of his mouth are tipping up in a shy, awkward smile. "I'm not being sneaky about it," Liam says. "Clearly. I mean, you caught me." 

Brett bumps him gently instead of responding verbally. Liam seems to take to non-verbal communication much more easily than verbal communication; maybe that's because he's been so isolated, maybe he was always like that. But now that Brett's worked it out, it's much, much easier to work him out. 

Liam bites his nails or the inside of lip when he's anxious, rubs the back of his neck when he's nervous, and curls his shoulders inwards when he's scared or sad. When he's happy, though, and content, he's usually sitting up straight, paying attention to everything Brett's saying, his eyes never leaving Brett's face. 

He didn't know one person could say so much without words. But Liam seems to be pretty effective at communicating _I'm scared_ or _I'm sad_ or _I'm hurt_. Brett just wasn't picking up the signals before now. 

"Temperature?" Liam asks.

"Yeah." Brett takes the thermometer from him and sticks it in his mouth, watching as Liam keeps stitching the hole in his jacket.

He's been different the last day or so. Quiet. Kind of withdrawn. He doesn't seem afraid, exactly - more... unsure of himself. He's staying pretty close to Brett; even though the snowstorm seems over, and Liam's usually eager to be outside, he hasn't even looked at the front door once.

Brett can't say he blames him for that. He'd be worried too. He's still livid about it, somewhere in the back of his head, but the guy is dead, and Liam's alright, mostly. There's nothing Brett can do with all that anger, so he's trying to let it go. 

The thermometer beeps. Liam takes it before Brett gets the chance; his face lights up.

"Good news?" Brett asks. "Am I gonna live?"

"You're back in the nineties," Liam says happily. 

Brett's smiling before he can stop it. "Yeah?" He likes seeing Liam happy.

"Yeah." Liam sits back; he's got his lower legs folded beneath him. "Looks like those antibiotics worked pretty well." 

"Yeah. Or maybe it was the nurse."

"Shut up," Liam mumbles, giving him a light shove. He's trying not to grin; Brett can tell. "So, you wanna do something?"

"Like what?"

"You could read," Liam says hopefully.

Brett chuckles. "You're really liking House of Leaves, huh?" he teases. "I've got a bit of a headache, I don't think I'll read. You can, though." 

Liam looks a little put out. "I'm okay. You want something for the headache?" 

Brett frowns. "You know those books aren't just mine, right?" he asks. "You found them. You can read them too." 

Liam smiles a little. "Nah. That's okay. I don't enjoy reading that much."

Brett watches him go back to the fire. He's still moving pretty strangely on his left side - accommodating for his shoulder, probably. Brett's starting to feel like there might be another reason Liam's not picking up a book of his own accord. In fact, Brett's never seen him read any of the thick novels lying around, even when Liam seems bored and restless. 

"Anyway," Brett says. "I'll read some House of Leaves when my headache's gone, okay?" 

Liam nods, but the smile he offers is half-hearted at best. Brett motions him over. 

Liam sinks onto the bed next to him, one leg folded beneath him. "Yeah?"

"I wanna check out your shoulder," Brett says. "Properly this time. You still don't have much movement in it." 

"Okay." Liam settles in. "What do you want me to do?"

"Can you take your hoodie off? I know it's cold." 

Liam shrugs like he isn't bothered, when Brett knows that Liam would probably abolish winter entirely if he could, and pulls his hoodie off - slowly on his left arm. The cut really doesn't seem to be bothering him too much. It's his shoulder that's still bugging him, even now.

"I know it's gonna suck for you," Brett says slowly, "but you reckon you can get your t-shirt off too?" 

"Okay," Liam grumbles reluctantly. He might not like being told what to do, but he always lets Brett call the shots where the medical stuff is concerned. Not that Brett expects him to know very much; Liam was fifteen when all this started, hardly old enough to have an idea about what injuries like this look like. 

He hears Liam almost whimper when he's trying to get the shirt off over his head and helps him - pulls it over Liam's right side so that he can get it off his left without raising his arm too much. He's hoping he's wrong about what he's thinking.

"Okay," Brett murmurs. Liam's sitting there, shivering, looking sad and cold, so Brett endeavours to hurry up. "Can you sit front-on for me? Put your shoulders back." He directs Liam gently. "That's it. Okay, hold still." 

Even with Liam shaking from the cold in the room, Brett can still see that his shoulders and collarbones align evenly, sloping at exactly the same points before they become the softly rounded upper shoulders. He breathes a sigh of relief. 

"Yeah. Thanks. You can put your shirt back on now."

"What were you looking for?" Liam manages to wriggle back into his shirt without Brett's help.

"Dislocated shoulder," he says. "If you'd had one, your shoulders would have been uneven." 

"But it's okay?" Liam asks searchingly.

Brett smiles. "It's okay." 

Liam puts his hoodie back on. "Want some tea?" 

"Yeah, thanks. I can probably get it-"

"Stay in bed," Liam says firmly - and fuck, Brett's pretty sure he learned that firm, but gentle tone from him. He sort of regrets it now, because it's surprisingly effective at keeping him where he is.

He must've just been hungry or dehydrated, because once he's had some tea and finished his breakfast, he's feeling much better. He opens the book and begins to read. Once he does, Liam sidles over - closer and closer every few minutes until he's lying down, almost as close to Brett as he can be.

Brett's barely five pages in when he notices Liam's slumped down, his head on Brett's thigh, arm thrown over his hips, dead asleep. He stops what he's doing, puts the book down, and looks down at Liam, sighing sadly. He rests a hand on the back of Liam's neck, softly, so the action doesn't wake him up.

"You've been through the wringer, huh?" he murmurs.

Liam, of course, doesn't answer. He's usually a light sleeper - lighter than Brett, anyway, more likely to wake up when Brett makes noise - but right now he seems well and truly knocked out. Brett decides to leave Liam where he is for as long as he can. 

"Still," Brett murmurs, staring at the fan of Liam's closed, dark gold eyelashes, "you're tougher than your average nuclear fallout shelter. So I suppose there's that." 

After a few more minutes, he starts gently pulling down the back of Liam's t-shirt. The bruising extends all the way up Liam's neck, almost into his hairline, and onto the back of his left arm as well. 

"Whoever threw you," Brett murmurs, "they threw you pretty hard." 

Liam shifts sleepily, opens his eyes halfway like he might be edging back towards consciousness. Brett stays quiet, watches as they slip shut again. Liam breathes a heavy, content sigh.

"Fuck me," Brett murmurs to himself. "You're adorable when you're sleeping. How the hell are you so angsty when you're awake?" 

He stays there for a long time, stroking Liam's hair absently as he keeps reading House of Leaves. Liam doesn't stir - judging by how slow and deep his breathing is, he's well and truly in the deepest part of his sleep cycle.

_Probably needs it_ , Brett thinks guiltily. _Between me nearly dying and him almost being killed, he's exhausted._

Eventually, he does have to wake Liam up, because he needs to piss pretty badly. Liam's slow to wake, bleary and disoriented for almost a whole minute, but he stumbles upright without complaint and helps Brett stand up. 

He's still pretty weak on his feet, so he's appreciative that Liam helps him outside and waits until he's done before leading him back in. He's shivering, but faintly, like he can't really be bothered to do it.

"We should get some more sleep," Brett says.

Liam yawns and nods. "Yeah. Take your tablet first though."

Brett swallows the pill obediently and lies down with Liam. He's not tired, but he could listen to Liam breathe all day and not get bored.

Eventually, he feels himself begin to slip off into sleep, takes one last good look at Liam's face, and thinks, _thank God you're alright_. And then, quietly, he's asleep.

~*~

When Brett wakes up, Liam's almost completely draped over him.

He suppresses a laugh. Now that Liam's comfortable with sleeping together, Brett has worked out that Liam's a real cuddler - at least while he's unconscious. This is the third day in a row he's woken up with half of Liam's chest pressed against his side, or his leg over Brett's waist, or his arm thrown carelessly around his neck. 

He thinks it started when he was sick, and Liam was trying to keep him warm. And after Liam came back from his little expedition - which Brett is both pissed at him for and immensely grateful for - it seemed to be a coping mechanism for him.

Brett's not going to begrudge him that. Liam hasn't metaphorically run for any hills in the aftermath of what happened, and he's even sort of talked about it. In his halting, tail-chasing way of getting down to his point, that is. 

Brett still doesn't know exact details - of just how far this guy went, of how Liam managed to wriggle away for long enough that the zombie got the upper hand. But he doesn't think he wants to, even if his mind is running wild with ideas of what might've happened.

Liam's left arm is draped across him; he lifts his hand, gently, and begins to turn Liam's arm towards him so he can see the wound.

Liam shifts against him sleepily, but he doesn't make a sound. His arm looks better - the wound is closed over completely, and Brett decides he's gonna take the stitches out today... if Liam lets him. Liam's really not kidding when he says he's not good with needles. 

Liam yawns as Brett moves slightly. "You wanna get up?" he mumbles.

"I'm alright," Brett says. "You're good." 

"Hmm." Liam nestles back in, his eyes still closed. He always takes a while to wake up in the morning. 

Brett laughs a little. "Sleepy?"

"Mm. Yeah." 

That's about when Brett realises that Liam's leg, across lap, is rubbing his dick - which is beginning to pay attention to the friction on it. 

_Fuck_ , Brett thinks frantically. _I really need him to stop moving._

"Um," he says. "Actually, yeah, I need to get up." 

"'Kay," Liam mumbles, rolling off him. 

Brett sits on the edge of the bed, staring out the window at the snow flurries. Every day, he realises more and more that he wants Liam - and not just because Liam's currently the only person Brett is one hundred percent sure is alive. He wants Liam because Liam's witty, smart, brave, and loyal. He wants Liam because Liam's opened up and let him in, has shown him the softest, most vulnerable spots in him, and something about that feels like it means something. 

He turns around. Liam's lying on his side, facing Brett, covers pulled right up to his nose. He seems to be well and truly asleep again. 

Brett stands up and begins breakfast.

~*~

He's getting so punchy being indoors that he suggests going out that day.

Liam looks apprehensive. "What about your cough?" he asks worriedly.

Brett shakes his head. "I've been in bed for almost a week, Li," he says. "I'm going crazy. My temperature's been back to normal for three days. As long as I keep taking the tablets I'll be fine." 

Liam looks like he really wants to say no; his hand is hovering around his mouth, and Brett knows, instinctively, that he's going to start chewing his fingernails any minute now.   
"Yeah," Liam murmurs. "Yeah, okay." 

_And there he goes_ , Brett thinks, watching as Liam starts chewing at the nail on his left thumb. Brett reaches out and pulls his hand away from his mouth gently.

"Hey, you want me to stay inside, and I will," Brett says gently. "But we need to go out sometime, okay? We need some more food." 

Liam nods. He tugs gently on his wrist, and Brett lets him go; something about Liam tucking his arm close to his body, the way he curls his shoulders down like he's trying to protect himself, makes Brett realise, very suddenly, that Liam's scared.

_Of course he's scared, you idiot_ , Brett berates himself. _He nearly got raped. Of course he's fucking scared of going outside again._

"Hey," Brett says.

Liam looks up. 

"I know you're scared," Brett says. "Yeah? I would be too. But you'll be with me this time. I won't let anything happen to you." 

"You might not have a choice," Liam says.

Brett frowns. "Liam..."

"Yeah." Liam stands up and begins pulling his jacket on. "Okay." He smiles nervously at Brett. "Can't stay in here forever." 

Brett can't help but feel like he accidentally pushed Liam into this, but Liam's insisting they go, now, and so Brett gets dressed and follows Liam out the front door. The fresh air hits his lungs and he doesn't know if he's ever smelled anything better; he inhales deeply, closing his eyes.

When he opens them, Liam's standing at the steps, watching him and smiling. "Good?"

"Yeah." Brett hops down the steps. "Let's go."

Liam takes point, as usual, and seems to be moving fairly quickly across the landscape despite his shoulder. "Where're we going?" Brett asks.

"Figure we'll make all our usual stops," Liam says. "Maybe go a little further? Only if you're okay, though. You start coughing, we go back." 

"Okay," Brett agrees easily. 

He follows Liam across the snow until he catches sight of a pharmacy. "Hey," he calls. "I'll catch up, okay?"

Liam turns. "Where're you going?"

"I need to piss," he says. 

Liam wrinkles his nose. "Fine." 

Brett chuckles as Liam keeps moving towards the supermarket. Then, after he's watched Liam enter safely, he heads straight for the pharmacy and steps out of the wind.

Glasses. He looks around. So they won't be prescription, which is what he assumes Liam had before, but they'll be something. Maybe they'll help enough that Liam can start to read on his own.

He's pretty sure he's correctly deduced that Liam's long-sighted. It would make sense; he seems to love stories, and likes hearing Brett read aloud, often dropping whatever else he's doing to listen. But in almost three months, Brett's never seen him pick up a book. Not once. He can't be short-sighted, because Brett's seen Liam take down a deer from hundreds of yards away. 

_He doesn't want me to know he's got bad vision_ , Brett thinks sadly as he heads through the store, looking for the glasses rack. _How am I gonna give these to him?_

He's just gonna have to hope that Liam does that thing where he's strangely understanding of what Brett's trying to do and accepts the gesture gracefully. He finally spots the glasses rack, goes over, picks up a few pairs and stares at them helplessly. He doesn't know what kind of frames Liam would like, so he gets a few different ones, tucks them into their cases, and puts them in his backpack.

At least now he can go, and Liam doesn't even seem to have realised he's missing.

He rounds the corner.

The first thing he notices are the bodies, of course. One zombie, slumped against a wall, its jaw open with mounds of bloody, decomposing flesh inside. 

And then the man.

Brett edges closer; the guy would've been as tall as him, at least, if not taller, and maybe forty or fifty pounds heavier than Brett. There's a splintered-off crossbow bolt in his shoulder.

He noticed a broken shelf nearby and swallows. And then, only after he's noticed the bodies, he sees the trail of blood, extending almost halfway across the store, stopping at another shelf, where there's a puddle of it.

_Liam._

This is where it happened. This is the body of the man who nearly raped and killed Liam.

_He crawled_. Brett feels his gorge rising. _He crawled away. He somehow got free and crawled away. He didn't even have time to get up._

"Brett?" 

Brett's never heard Liam sound that scared before, but he's halfway through bending over and puking right where he's standing, so he can't answer.

He hears Liam call him again, and then the crunch of boots coming closer, and rapidly. 

"Brett." Liam's finally made it to the store, and Brett hears him hurrying over. Liam's hand lands on his back. "Brett, are you-"

And then he stops. Brett knows Liam's just worked out why Brett's sick, where they are.

Brett straightens up shakily. "Liam-"

"What the fuck are you doing here?" Liam's visibly upset, his eyes glossy. "What, you had to see it for yourself or something?"

"No," Brett says desperately, grabbing Liam's arms. "No, I didn't know, Li. I didn't know this was the store-"

" _I thought you were dead!_ " Liam bellows. 

Brett takes a step back, letting Liam go in the process. He's never heard Liam's voice that loud before. "Liam-"

"I called you and you didn't answer!" Liam yells. "You told me you just needed to piss and that you'd catch up and I couldn't find you! I thought-" His voice breaks, briefly, but he only pauses to swallow and then continue. "I thought you'd rolled over and died from your fucking cough or the Keepers had gotten you or something!" 

"I'm sorry," Brett breathes. "I didn't think-"

"Obviously!" 

Brett doesn't bother finishing that sentence, because he feels like "I didn't think you'd realise I was gone" is only going to make Liam angrier. 

Liam doesn't seem to be gearing up to yell again. He's staring at Brett, breathing hard through his nose, his jaw clenched and eyes ablaze with anger. After a moment, they drift to look at the scene behind Brett.

"Liam, don't look at that," Brett says hurriedly.

"I'm going back," Liam says abruptly. "Do whatever the fuck you want. I honestly don't care. But I'm going back."

With that, before Brett can respond, Liam's turned and left, his pace brisk and his shoulders tense. Brett puts his arms over his head.

He's pretty fucking shaken. He's never seen Liam like that - never seen him freak out and completely lose his temper. He knows Liam said he has I.E.D, but he feels like that wasn't what he was seeing then. 

He's trying to work out what part of this upset Liam the most - Brett wandering off and Liam not being able to find him? The fact that he ended up in the same pharmacy Liam was almost raped in? That Brett lied to him? 

He sets off walking, back towards their apartment, still feeling utterly shell-shocked. And when he sees just how far the supermarket is from the pharmacy, he gets it.

_He's mad because I told him I wouldn't let anything happen to him, and I left him_ , Brett realises. _He went out for the first time since it happened and I left him on his own._

He closes his eyes. He meant to do something nice for Liam, but instead, he's probably made Liam think he can't trust him. And that feels pretty terrible. 

He's almost halfway back when he realises the footprints in the snow, left by Liam, are gone. He stops and closes his eyes. 

"I know you're there, Li," he says quietly.

Liam stalks out from behind a building. He's still visibly furious, but he keeps pace with Brett, now, not saying anything.

"Why're you-"

"I wouldn't let you walk back by yourself." Liam's upset. Brett knows he is. "It's not safe." 

Brett stops walking and risks taking Liam's arms again. The look on Liam's face warns him that it had better be good.

"Liam, I'm sorry I left you," he says desperately.

_That's it_ , Brett realises when Liam's face softens, almost imperceptibly. _That's the main reason_. "I'm sorry," he repeats. "I didn't think. I was going to go into the pharmacy and catch up with you. I really was. I didn't know that one was..."

"Don't," Liam says quietly. "I know exactly which pharmacy that was." 

Brett closes his mouth. They stand there for a long moment, Brett's arms still holding Liam's still. 

"We should go back," Liam says eventually. 

"You don't want-"

"No." With that, Liam starts walking, and Brett follows helplessly. He doesn't know how to fix what he's done here, how to make it right - or even how to make it better.

If he'd known that was the one... God. And Liam went back in there, had to see everything all over again...

Liam pushes open the door to their apartment and slinks over to the fireplace. Brett only follows because he's cold, and he's careful to not sit too close to Liam, wanting to give him some time to cool off. If the weather permitted it, he'd just wait around outside and come back after a few hours. It doesn't, unfortunately. 

He sits down and takes his shoes off, then tries to make himself useful by doing one of their weekly inventory count-ups. Liam ignores him so effectively Brett begins to wonder if he even exists. 

Still, he's not raging out anymore, and he's not crying or anything. He's just pissed. Brett's not sure how to deal with "pissed" because it's not one of Liam's regular settings, but at least he's not yelling anymore.

"Don't do that again."

Brett jumps. It's been well over an hour since Liam's said anything, and when he turns around, Liam's giving him this anxious, searching expression. "What?"

"Don't do that again," Liam repeats. "Just - wander off like that. In the middle of the snow. I really did think something had happened to you." 

"I'm sorry," Brett says again, as sincerely as he can. "I shouldn't have done that - and I shouldn't have left you on your own."

Liam looks down. "I can take care of myself," he mumbles.

"I know," Brett says, treading carefully. He still feels like he might be on pretty thin ice where Liam's temper is concerned. "But it's nice to have someone backing you up too."  
Liam nods. "Sorry for yelling."

"It's okay. I would've too." Brett wants to show Liam the glasses, but he feels like he should probably leave him alone to process for a bit. "Later on, I wanna take your stitches out," he says.

"Yeah. Okay."

There's another long silence that stretches forever. Liam's started biting his lip, subtly, like he's trying not to get busted. Brett doesn't have the heart to tell him to stop. 

"Li," he says.

Liam looks up at him. Brett takes a moment to try and gauge his mood; he doesn't seem angry anymore, or even annoyed, just kind of deflated. "Yeah?" he asks slowly when Brett fails to say anything.

"I uh - there was a reason for my detour."

"Yeah?" Liam's voice is neutral, but his shoulders have gone stiff again.

"Yeah." Brett takes his pack over and sits near Liam - not close, but enough that Liam can see what he's doing. "Here."

He takes out one of the glasses cases and hands it to Liam. And for a moment, he thinks maybe he was wrong - because Liam looks pretty blank for a second. And then he looks outright shocked.

"How did you know?" he asks. "I didn't-"

"I didn't," Brett admits. "I guessed." 

Liam opens the case, and Brett's relieved to find a small smile beginning on his face. "You even got the right ones," he says. "But how'd you know my short-distance vision was the problem?"

"You can take down a deer at two hundred feet," Brett points out, "but you won't read even when you're bored as hell. I just guessed." He smiles a little when Liam puts the glasses on. "So? How are they?"

"They're good." Liam looks a little shy, though. "Do I look like a dork?" 

"It suits you," Brett says. "I know they're not prescription glasses, which is kind of what I assume you had before, but they'll do, right?" 

"Yeah. Yeah, they're good." Liam's looking around, blinking, and his eyes land on Brett's face. He actually laughs. "Whoa."

"What?"

"I don't think I've ever seen your face high-definition before," Liam says.

"Am I that ugly?" Brett teases.

"Nah. The opposite." Liam doesn't seem to think much about the words once he's said them; he's leaning over and picking up a book, then flipping it open. "Wow," he murmurs. "I can actually read. This is pretty cool." He looks at Brett. "Did I pester you so much you decided you had to do something about it?"

Brett laughs. "No. Just... thought it would be nice." He shuffles a little closer. "Liam, I'm really sorry I wandered away," he says. "And that you had to follow me and find me in there. I didn't even think you might've freaked out."

Liam gives him a hesitant smile. "That's okay," he says. "Just... please don't ever do it again."

"I won't." Brett leans down a little to meet Liam's eyes. "You're okay now?"

"Do you mean am I still angry?" 

"No. I mean..."

Liam nods, then follows that up with a shrug. "I dunno. I don't feel safe." He shakes his head. "It's ridiculous, I kind of did before. Even with the zombies around. But I know how to deal with those. I don't know how to deal with people."

"You're safe," Brett says. "I promise."

Liam smiles at him. Something about it is sad. "Don't make promises you can't keep, Brett." 

Before Brett can reply, Liam sighs, takes the glasses off. "Didn't you say you wanted to take my stitches out?" 

"Yeah, now that we're done moving around a lot, I will," Brett says. "You're gonna have to hold still and be patient, though, okay?"

"Okay." Liam watches as Brett goes to the medkit and grabs the scissors and a pair of tweezers. "Um, is this gonna hurt?"

"It shouldn't," Brett says gently. "If it does, let me know and we'll leave them in a little while longer." 

Liam nods, holds out his arm. Brett lifts the first knot with the tweezers, carefully, looks up at Liam's face. Liam blinks back at him, almost like he's saying "what are you waiting for?"

Brett clips the first stitch, gently, and begins tugging it gently. Liam pulls a face.

"That hurt?"

"No. Just feels weird."

"Well," Brett murmurs, "if it doesn't hurt and you aren't bleeding, I'm guessing they're about ready to come out. So just hold still and I'll finish it off." He lifts the next one, cuts it. "I wanna check your back, too," he murmurs. "You've got bruising on the back of your neck."

"I do?"

"Yeah. I just wanna make sure it's healing up okay. You still look like you're moving kind of funny." Another stitch goes. Liam's determinedly looking away from what Brett's doing. "Still hurts?"

"Yeah. It does. Mostly in the morning."

"Probably because you're stiff from sleeping," Brett murmurs. "Okay, we're done."

"Really?" Liam looks down at his arm. "I'm like, good as new."

Brett laughs. "Not quite. Can you get your shirt off?"

"Yeah, I think so." Liam starts lifting his shirt over his head, but Brett hears him give a grunt of pain and steps in to help, pulling it the rest of the way off Liam's torso. He winces when he sees the aggressive whorls of colour on Liam's skin.

"So?" Liam asks. "How's it look?"

"You want gentle or succinct?"

"Uh... what's succinct?" Liam asks sheepishly.

Brett smiles a little. "The short version," he says. "Blunt. To the point."

"Yeah. That one."

"Okay." Brett leans forward, tilting Liam's shoulder gently so he can see more of the bruising at the top. "You look like a fucking Picasso painting." 

"You need to stop saying all this college-level shit," Liam says, clearly flustered as he turns to look at Brett over his shoulder. "I was a fucking freshman before all this, okay? I was failing biology. The only thing I was good at was - ow!"

Brett yanks his hands back when Liam yelps in pain. "Sorry," he breathes. He's just touched on a dark purple bit of Liam's back, right above his shoulder blade, and pressed to try and gauge how bad the swelling is. "Sorry, are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm okay." Liam turns to look at him again. "Took me by surprise, that's all." 

"You're pretty black and blue there," Brett says. "That's why you're not moving very well. Your shoulder blade must've taken most of the impact for you." He moves up to Liam's neck, parts his hair a little at the back - it's getting almost long, now. Liam shivers beneath him.

"You okay?"

"Yeah." Liam's voice sounds strange, though. 

Brett tries to get a good look at the bruising on Liam's neck. It doesn't look as bad as the rest, though the area is still pretty pink and blue. "Man, you're lucky you don't have a concussion," Brett murmurs. "An inch upward and your brain would probably be a slushy." 

"Ew," Liam comments, but he's shivering again, and as Brett parts his hair elsewhere - trying to see just how much of Liam's neck is injured - he suddenly slumps his shoulders and tips his head forward.

Brett stops, surprised. "What the hell was that?" he asks. "Did I hurt you?"

"No," Liam says awkwardly. His ears are going red. "My neck is really, really sensitive."

"Oh." It suddenly clicks for Brett that this is probably an erogenous spot for Liam, because he's still trembling, but he doesn't seem cold, and he's more relaxed than Brett's ever seen him awake. "Ohh," he says again as the realisation dawns on him. "Shit, I'm sorry."

"It's okay," Liam mumbles. "Not like you knew or anything."

"You want me to stop?" 

"Yeah." Then, after a moment, "No."

Brett laughs. At least Liam can make it a joke, which makes it a lot easier to deal with. Still, he's done exploring the damage, so he stops playing with Liam's neck and helps him back into his shirt, then his hoodie.

"Sometimes when Garrett used to get stressed, he'd grab me there," Liam says suddenly. "In front of people. You know. Assert his dominance or whatever."

Brett pauses what he's doing to look at Liam, who's watching him - cataloguing his reaction, judging by the apprehensive look on his face. 

Brett swallows. "He did that regularly?" he asks, nonchalantly as possible.

Liam shrugs. "Regularly enough." 

"Did it bother you?" Brett asks.

"It made me uncomfortable. I didn't realise it was really wrong until I got a little older. But it's hard to think of him in a bad way now, though, because he's dead, and you're not supposed to speak ill of the dead or whatever." Liam looks at the sack in Brett's hands. "What's that?" he asks.

"It's a heat pack," Brett explains. "I found it lying around when we were out once. Good for muscular pains. I'm thinking it might help your shoulder." He moves around to Liam, puts the heat pack against the worst area. "Normally you'd ice bruising," Brett murmurs, "but I'm thinking with bruising that bad, most of the pain you're in is probably due to some muscular damage as well."

"Thanks," Liam says, giving him a small smile.

There's a bit of a silence; Brett makes sure he repositions the heat pack every so often so it doesn't get too hot. "I had a girlfriend," he says.

"Yeah?"

"Before the outbreak. Yeah." He tries to focus on what he's doing. "First girl I ever seriously saw in college. Her name was Josie. Anyway, we were together for almost two years. I was gonna propose to her, eventually. Not then, because we were basically just kids. But in a few years... yeah, I'd planned it and everything."

"What was the plan?" Liam asks.

"The plan was to take her to the place we'd met," Brett says. "And have a treasure hunt that would end with her finding me down on one knee. It was pretty full on. I'm kind of embarrassed just thinking about it now." 

"Don't be," Liam says. "When I got with Garrett - well, he was my first. I watched a lot of porn trying to figure out what went where. But uh, this is about you."

Brett can't help but chuckle at Liam's little story. "Yeah, nice deflection," he teases. "Anyway, one day, she comes over to my dorm. And just as I'm looking at her - we were having sex - I'm looking down at her and thinking about how much I love her and how beautiful she is, and she suddenly says to me, I wanna break up." 

Liam's jaw drops. "She what?"

"Yeah."

"... Did she let you finish?"

"I didn't really feel like it." Brett shakes his head. "So I was basically going, what the fuck? What do you mean you want to break up? And that's when she really pulls out all the stops and tells me she hasn't loved me in a long time and that there's someone else." 

Liam turns around fully. "Dude," he says, "what the fuck?" 

"Yeah. I was still inside her and everything. She was pretty calm about it."

Liam's still staring at him, mouth open with shock. It'd probably be a funny expression if it weren't for the fact that it still kind of stings to think about.

"You were still inside her?" Liam demands. "She told you she didn't love you and that she was seeing someone else while you were still fucking her?"

"Yeah."

"That's so fucked up." 

Now he laughs; Liam has a way of putting things that really sums them up, and his indignant expression, on Brett's behalf, is kind of sweet. "Yeah. It is. Anyway, my point wasn't really that my girlfriend broke up with me while I was balls-deep. My point is that people do shitty things, and they don't get to be excused just because they're dead." 

Liam nods slowly.

"If he was cruel to you," Brett says softly, "in any way, he shouldn't have been. He doesn't get a free pass because he died. And neither does she."

"She died?" Liam asks.

"Yeah. In the outbreak. Her and the new guy on the scene got bitten." 

"Wow," Liam murmurs. "I'm sorry."

"It's alright." Brett shrugs. "I haven't been with anyone since."

"Really?"

"Nope." 

Liam looks at him, really looks, properly, like he can see what Brett's getting at. "She really hurt you, huh?" he asks softly.

"Yeah." Brett adjusts the heat pack. "But you know what? It could've been a lot worse." 

"... How?" Liam asks dubiously.

"I could've walked in on her cheating on me."

"Well, I guess when you put it like that, yeah." 

~*~

They wait until Liam's shoulder has healed up a little more to make another attempt at going outside.

It's snowing when they do, but not as hard, and Liam only wears three layers instead of four. He's moving a lot more easily now, and he's in a good mood as they trek across the snow. 

Upon passing a bar, Brett has an idea. "Li," he calls.

Liam tracks back to him. "Yeah?" he asks curiously.

Brett jerks his head at the door. "You ever had a drink?" 

"Of what?" Liam asks blankly.

Brett ruffles his hair. "You're so young," he teases. "Follow me." 

He enters the bar carefully, but it's devoid of life, undead or otherwise. Behind the counter are still bottles of vodka, whiskey, and bourbon - plus about a hundred other things Brett doesn't know the name of. 

"What are we doing here?" Liam asks.

Brett grabs a glass and a bottle of vodka, smiling cheekily at Liam. "I'm giving you your first drink."

"My first drink?"

"Have you ever had alcohol before?"

Liam shakes his head curiously. "Have you?"

"Yeah. I was in a fraternity, Liam. Of course I did."

"But you weren't twenty one."

Brett snorts. "That doesn't stop anyone," he says. "Here." He pours a shot of vodka into a glass. "You don't have to. Just thought it might be fun."

Liam smiles at him, almost nervously. "Okay." He puts his crossbow on the counter. "So... what's the best way to do this?"

"Knock it back and swallow it all at once. Like Nyquil." 

Liam nods, looking apprehensive. "Is this... gonna be really gross?"

"Maybe."

Liam nods again. Then, slowly, he picks up the shot and tips it back into his mouth.

Brett grins as Liam screws his face up, gags, turns, and spits the shot out all over the floor, and Brett bursts into laughter at the revolted expression on his face.

"That's disgusting," Liam croaks miserably. "What the fuck?" 

Brett chuckles, pats Liam's back, and pours himself a shot, swallowing it with barely a flinch. "You get used to it."

"That's what everyone gets so fucking excited over?" Liam's eyeing the bottle with disdain. "I bet you could run backup generators off that stuff."

"It's nicer when you mix it," Brett laughs. "That was great."

Liam shakes his head, but he's smiling a little. "You're mean to me," he says, and holy shit, is he pouting? Brett's sure it's for effect, but still. It's kind of cute at the same time. 

They hang around for a while - Liam takes up a spot on one of the dusty barstools, and Brett stays behind the counter, marvelling at all the near-untouched bottles of liquor. He talks about college a bit, about his fraternity.

"Did you ever do anything dumb while you were drunk?" Liam asks.

Brett grins. "Uh, you could say that."

Liam perks up, beginning to smirk. "What'd you do?"

"I um." Brett laughs. "I got a tattoo drunk."

Liam covers his face, but his eyes are twinkling behind his fingers. "Oh God."

"Yeah. I was completely shitfaced. Walked with two of my friends to the closest, shadiest tattoo studio. I told the tattoo artist to surprise me, laid down, and let him get to work."

"You told him to _surprise you_?" Liam demands, looking vaguely horrified.

"Yeah."

"What did you end up with?"

"Oh, man." Brett sits down. "I got uh - my friends called it the rat tit."

Liam's jaw drops. "The rat tit?"

"Yeah." Brett pulls away his layers of clothing until his left pectoral is bared. "I had the eyes... mouth... whiskers... ears." He traces where everything was. "And my nipple was the nose." 

Liam's doubled over for a moment, and when he comes back up for air, he's howling with laughter. Brett grins; he's never made Liam laugh like this before. He's pretty sure he can see all of Liam's teeth right now.

"You're so fucking stupid," Liam snickers. "How long did you have it for?"

"About a year."

That must be even funnier, because Liam's wheezing, his eyes watering with mirth. "So yeah," Brett says. "The mandala design was just to cover it up. And it really needed to be big, you know? Because the rat took up most of my left pec."

Liam wipes his eyes. "You kept a surprise rat tattoo on the left side of your chest for a year," he giggles. "I think that might be the best thing I've ever heard. Why? Why did you keep it? Who told you it was a good idea?"

"It was a conversation starter," Brett says. "No one had to tell me."

Liam wipes his eyes again. When he looks back at Brett, his expression is genuinely soft and fond and open, affectionate and playful without being mean. 

"You're dumb," Liam says fondly. "But you're also great."

Brett shrugs. "Happy to impress." 

Liam, still kind of chuckling, stands up. "Come on. We should loot some stuff and get out of here. Make it a short trip." 

They spend the next three hours traipsing in and out of stores, with Brett taking the majority of the weight. Still, they don't covet nearly the volume they would - because the pneumonia left Brett weak, and he's still recovering, but Liam's shoulder also can't support the weight. 

If he's honest with himself, neither of them should be out. Not like this. But they don't really have much of a choice about it. They're starting to run seriously low on food. Not low enough to warrant panicking, but still.

"Brett."

Brett rounds the corner and sees Liam staring curiously up at a pallet, stored high up in the back room of a supermarket. "What'd you find?' he asks.

"I dunno. It might be the motherload, though." Liam circles around it. "I'm wondering if we can get up there somehow." 

"If I boosted you, could you get up there?" Brett asks. Liam's pretty good at climbing; Brett's seen him tackle obstacles nobody else would've attempted. "I mean your shoulder. Reckon you could get up there, or would it give out?"

Liam rotates his shoulder and winces a little. "I think it'd be fine," he says. "If it was only for a few seconds, that is." 

"Okay." Brett puts his things down; Liam ditches his pack and crossbow. "But if it hurts, you have to let me know, okay? Be careful."

"I'll be careful." With that, he steps into Brett's cupped hands, and Brett pushes upwards as hard as he can. Liam manages to snag the platform and begins wriggling up onto it.  
Once he's up there, Brett looks up. "You okay up there?"

"I'm okay. Doesn't feel that steady, but it's got a pallet on it, so it must be, right?" Liam takes out his knife. "Who do you think got rid of all the zombies?" he asks.  
"I kind of assumed you did," Brett admits.

Liam looks down at him incredulously as he starts sawing at the thick plastic around the pallet. "That's a pretty high kill count, even for me," he says. "I took out a lot of them, but only ever if I needed to."

"Just seems strange," Brett says. "I mean, the last zombie I saw was... probably that one you put down in the middle of the street."

"Maybe they all herded together," Liam muses. "They kind of tend to do that."

"You'd think that was counterproductive, right?" Brett asks. "A herd means they're all competing for the same food source. You got anything on that?"

Liam shakes his head. "I don't care how they act," he says. "Long as they don't munch on me." The plastic finally gives. "Sweet. Alright, let's see what's in here." 

"How much daylight have we got left?" Brett asks.

But Liam doesn't answer him. "Holy shit," he says gleefully.

"What?"

Liam reaches into one of the cardboard boxes and produces four value packs of oatmeal. "There's like fifty of these in every box!" he says. 

Brett grins. "How many boxes?"

"I can't even count them." Liam starts tossing them down. "We should get as much as we can today, then come back. We're gonna be fucking sick of oatmeal but hey, we'll be alive, right? And then once game comes back, after the winter-"

"So much food," Brett sighs.

They spend the rest of the day working their asses off, hauling food to and from the apartment. After one trip, Liam has the genius idea of using some of the plastic wrapping to create a sled, letting them haul more back at a time.

It takes them a good four hours to clear the pallet. Liam's in pretty good spirits, which is nice to see; his shoulder must be hurting, but it doesn't seem to be bothering him.  
By the time they're finished, they've still got an hour of sunlight left. Liam's trudging along beside Brett, his cheeks pink with cold and his eyes tired, but happy.

"Why do you think there was so much food there?" Brett asks. "Why hasn't it been looted?"

Liam shrugs. "Probably couldn't reach it. I never would've tried on my own." 

"Suppose so. Anyway, we're gonna eat well tonight." He realises Liam's not with him anymore. "Liam? Where the hell did you-"

Brett startles, gasping, when something cold and wet hits the back of his head. "What-"

He turns around, and Liam's standing there, grinning, rolling another snowball up in his hands.

"Oh, it's on," Brett breathes, and leans down, scooping up some snow. Liam laughs, and then he's running. Brett follows him. 

"Really?" he yells, chasing Liam across the snow. "Seriously? I grew up in Minnesota, you idiot!"

Liam, apparently laughing too hard to keep running, stops, bent over and catching his breath. "I'm sorry," he giggles, clearly utterly unrepentant. "No, I'm serious. I'm sorry. I'm sorry!" But he's still grinning like a maniac.

"Yeah? You're gonna be." Brett grabs him and forces a handful of snow down the back of his shirt, making Liam gasp and jump. "Yeah, fuck you." 

"Cold," Liam laughs helplessly. "Help me get it - hey, no! That's not helping!"

Brett's hefted Liam up over his shoulder, holding him firmly as he squirms helplessly and laughs, probably worsening the amount of snow inside his clothes. 

Finally, Liam gives up on his squirming. He's still laughing, holding onto Brett's shoulders. "Okay," he says, laughter ringing in his voice. "Okay, you win. Put me down." 

"What was that?" Brett asks idly, deliberately bouncing his knees so that Liam's voice is jumbled.

"I said put me down," Liam laughs.

"Oh. Put you down." Brett grins to himself. "Okay." 

"Huh? Wha - no!" Liam's renewed his efforts to get away, wriggling furiously in Brett's grip. "No, don't drop me in - BRETT!" 

Brett chuckles as he deposits Liam bodily in a pile of snow and stands back to admire his handiwork. "Beautiful," he says, satisfied. "One Liam-flavoured popsicle coming right up." 

Liam struggles up onto his elbows. "Fuck you," he says, but he's smiling even as his voice shakes with the cold. "Now help me up."

"Fuck you, help me up," Brett mimics back at him, but leans down and takes Liam's hand, pulling him to his feet. "That's a great way to convince someone to help you out, Li." 

Liam's still chuckling. "I'm cold now."

"You started it," Brett reminds him. "But yeah, let's go back." 

Once they're inside, Liam's shedding all his wet clothes and searching for clean, dry ones. Brett gets a blanket around his shoulders.

Liam straightens up, pulls it close. He's smiling. "Thanks." He still sounds a little breathless, and he's shivering, but he also seems genuinely happy. Carefree. Brett wonders if this was what he was like before the apocalypse hit and forced Liam into survival mode. 

"No problem," Brett says. He smiles, rubbing Liam's shoulders to try and warm him up a little. "Been a pretty good day, huh? Food, didn't get attacked, nobody got hurt. Snowball fight. That I absolutely wrecked you in." 

"I heard about your rat tit," Liam giggles breathlessly. "And had my first drink."

"That didn't count. You spat it on the floor. Weak bitch." 

Liam gives him a shove, but he's still smiling. "Wanna have a feast?"

"Damn right I wanna have a feast." Brett steps away. "Get warm and dry. I'll get everything started, okay?" 

"Okay." Brett doesn't miss that Liam goes straight for one of Brett's hoodies, pulling it over his smaller frame and almost drowning in it - it's already oversized on Brett. Next he's stripping off his jeans, revealing his legs, which are pale and speckled with blonde hair.

Brett looks away as Liam pulls sweats on, then sit down. After a moment, he takes out the glasses Brett got him and picks up House of Leaves.

Brett doesn't say anything - he feels like Liam's kind of shy about the glasses still. 

" _I just fixed myself some tea on the hot plate here_." Brett tries to act nonchalant about Liam's soft voice, reading House of Leaves to Brett the way Brett has for him. " _My stomach's gone. I can barely keep even this honey milked-up stuff down but I need the warmth._ " 

Liam pauses to accept a cup of tea from Brett, smiling a little at the coincidence. "Thanks," he says.

"No problem." Brett starts the oatmeal, now.

Liam clears his throat. " _I'm in a hotel now. My studio's history. A lot these days is history._ " He looks up at Brett questioningly. "I think I slept through some of this."

"You did," Brett says. "Completely out of it."

Liam shrugs. "Oh well," he says. "Guess I'll just start from the start at some point."

Brett takes the first lot of oatmeal off. Liam clears his throat again and goes back to his reading.

" _I haven't even washed the blood off yet. Not all of it's mine either. Still caked around my fingers. Signs of it on my shirt. "What's happened here?" I keep asking myself. "What have I done?" What would you have done?_ "

Liam swallows. Brett thinks for a moment that he's going to stop, but he continues on.

" _I went straight for the guns and I loaded them and then I tried to decide what to do with them. The obvious thing was shoot something. After all, that's what guns are designed to do - shoot something. But who? Or what? I didn't have a clue. There were people and cars outside my hotel window. Midnight people I didn't know. Midnight cars I'd never seen before. I could have shot them. I could have shot them all._ " 

Brett watches as Liam puts the book down, crosses his arms over his chest. "Do you ever think about that?" he asks timidly. "That... we've probably hurt people who just wanted the same thing we did?" 

Brett nods. "Sometimes. But we haven't done much of that lately."

"You haven't," Liam says softly.

Brett scoots closer to him. "Liam," he says softly. "He didn't want the same thing you did. And you didn't kill him. The zombie did." 

Liam dips his head. "I could've warned him," he admits quietly. "I had time. I could've told him the zombie was there. I didn't."

"Liam-"

"I didn't even freeze. That wasn't why I never said anything." Liam swallows. "I didn't want to help him. That's the first time I've ever just... not helped. Not done anything." 

Brett doesn't really know what to do, but he refuses to lose Liam to this - to what that fucking prick of a human did to him. He moves closer, wraps his arm around Liam's shoulders. The truth is, it's easy to pretend it's all fine during the daytime. But every night since it happened Brett's woken up to Liam whimpering and crying in his sleep.

"He didn't deserve your help," he says quietly. "Would you have let him do it to me? To anyone else? Would you have let him walk away, actively helped him survive, if it had been anyone else?"

Liam shakes his head.

"There you go." Brett pulls him in closer. "It wasn't your fault. You're worth just as much as anyone else, Liam. And I'm glad you didn't let him live. If you had, I would have tracked him down and killed him myself." 

Liam looks up at him slowly. "Why?"

"Because you're my friend." Brett smiles at him sadly. "I just want you to be safe. I know that's a pipe dream. But I'm really hoping that one day, this all smooths over and you get to go to college, and play lacrosse, and get a tattoo. Do what you want to do with your life, and not what you need to do." 

Liam's eyes glimmer a little when he finally meets Brett's gaze, and he nods. Brett watches his throat work harder than it should as Liam swallows.

Then Liam's reaching up and wrapping his arms around Brett's shoulders. Brett thinks he might be crying, but he's not that sure, so he just gets his arms around Liam and holds him tight. 

It's almost five minutes before Liam pulls away, rubbing his face. "Fuck," he mumbles. "I'm a wreck."

"I think you're doing pretty well, honestly," Brett says. "I would've had a total meltdown by now."

"Give it a week," Liam says in that voice that's meant to convey that he's joking, but sounds sort of sad and serious at the same time. 

Brett smiles kindly at him. "You'll be alright. You've got me."

"Only till the end of winter, though," Liam says, so quiet Brett can barely hear him. "Then you're going to Oakridge and..." 

Oakridge. Brett had forgotten. "Li," he says. "I'm not leaving you."

"Brett-"

"I'm not leaving you. If you decide you wanna go with me, that's great. If you decide you want to stay here, I'm staying here. But I'm not leaving you, alright?" He shrugs helplessly. "How can I? I don't even know if my friends are alive. But you are, and I think we make kind of a good team." 

Liam smiles. It seems kind of fragile. "I guess we do."

"So. Long story short - yeah, eventually, I'll go to Oakridge. But I'm not going without you, and if that takes another week or another year or another ten years, I'm waiting, okay? And we'll go together." On impulse, he leans down, puts his forehead against Liam's. "Okay?"

He feels Liam's breath on his lips, kind of shaky. "Okay," Liam whispers back.

His fingers are skimming Brett's hand, shyly, hesitantly, and Brett moves to grasp them. Liam closes his eyes slowly as he grips Brett's fingers.

_You're okay, Liam_ , Brett thinks to himself. _You're okay._


	11. Chapter Eleven - Haze

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am sorry. Angst abound. Thank you for reading, and all the well wishes! <3 Also, trigger warning for this chapter - mentions of rape and mentions of past suicidal thoughts.

**Chapter Eleven - Haze**  
Brett wakes up slowly.

He's intensely warm, that's the first thing he notices. The second thing he notices is that he's got an armful of Liam snuggled up in his arms.

He smiles sleepily to himself. It's pretty rare that Liam actually lets Brett spoon him like this, so Brett enjoys it while he can, pulling Liam closer and tucking Liam's head under his chin. They've come a long way since they met, and it shows when Liam barely stirs. 

Brett's got his arms wrapped pretty well around Liam's waist. He's not as ribby or boney as he was after he returned from his little chemist adventure - they've been eating a fuckload of oatmeal and he's almost back to how he looked before Brett got sick and the winter hit them hard. 

Brett shifts a bit, moves the arm wrapped over Liam's waist, and pulls the back of his t-shirt down a little. The bruising on his neck and shoulder have pretty much disappeared, apart from the worst spots, and Liam's almost got a full range of movement back.

Brett smiles again and puts his arm back where it was. After a moment, Liam makes a mumbling noise and rolls over - so slowly Brett tries not to laugh, because Liam is sort of reminding him of a sloth - and nestles his face up against Brett's chest. 

_Adorable, prickly, defensive, hot-headed little dork,_ Brett thinks fondly. He strokes Liam's back from his neck, right down to his hips, and then back up. 

Liam grumbles at him. "I wanna keep sleeping," he slurs.

"Okay." Brett smiles. "I'm getting up, though." Now that Liam knows him, he sleeps a lot longer, and deeper. It's little things like that that remind Brett that Liam's a teenager. 

It feels kind of strange, still, foreign - the amount of trust Liam seems to have in him, that is. Brett thinks it's partially that he can actually be trusted, and partially that Liam's been so lonely for so long that he's probably vulnerable to any interaction, not that anyone would know that, looking at him.

Still, he's sort of reluctant to psychoanalyse Liam's behaviour. Because sometimes Liam seems like a pretty normal guy - he drums on his thighs absently when he's bored, gets moody and irritable over dumb stuff. But then he's also pretty prone to fits of productivity and insight that Brett's never seen before, in anyone. He's not sure if that's just Liam, or whether the apocalypse did this to him. 

He looks over at Liam, who's spread out on his back with his face tilted away from the windows. He slept through the night - a pretty rare occurrence - but seems like he might be slipping rapidly into a nightmare. 

Liam's not good. Brett's pretty much worked that out. He always seems fine during the day, but as night comes around and Liam has to go to sleep, he ends up withdrawing completely. Brett's not dumb; this kind of thing - and he avoids using the word, because Liam flinches when he does - is hard enough to deal with when you aren't a teenager and it isn't the end of the fucking world. 

He can't get the scene out of his mind - the blood, everywhere, and it makes sense in hindsight, how shaky and weak Liam seemed in the aftermath, because the blood loss just at the scene seemed significant - never mind that he was still sort of bleeding by the time Brett stitched him up. 

He got Liam pretty good, though, Brett admits to himself. Liam's fucking lucky it didn't get infected. 

He's not entirely sure how Liam got away. The guy was huge, Brett saw that; maybe he was sick or something, weak, which would've meant that Liam could've gained the upper hand for even a fraction of a second. That's all it takes to win or lose a fight now. 

If he's honest with himself - and he's trying to be - he wants to sit Liam down and actually talk about it. About what almost happened, about the actual act, about how the fuck Liam got away. But every time he gears up to do it, Liam seems to know, somehow, clams up and refuses to say anything.

He looks over. Liam's just woken up - from a nightmare - and he's got his hands over his face, his breathing heavy. Brett knows better than to talk. The most effective way of talking to Liam is to let him do it in his own time. 

It's almost ten minutes before Liam finally seems to calm down enough to sit up and scruff his hair up. Brett cut it a few days ago, and now when Liam runs his hands through it, it sticks up on end. He looks a little older with the shorter hair, anyway. 

Brett watches as Liam swings his legs out of bed and sits quietly for a few moments, blinking blearily, rubbing his eyes and the back of his neck. He looks like he could probably go back to sleep, and Brett's about to tell him so when Liam finally speaks.

"What's for breakfast?" he asks tiredly.

"Three guesses," Brett comments back.

"Oatmeal. Oatmeal. And more oatmeal."

"Well, we knew we were gonna get sick of it." Brett passes Liam a bowl of the strawberry one, because Liam seems to like that one the most. Liam comes over, sits down, and sighs heavily, then produces a jaw-cracking yawn.

"You kidding?" Brett asks, nudging him. "You slept for ages." 

Liam gives him a small smile. "Yeah." 

There's a long silence while Liam eats, yawning every now and then. He's leaning up against Brett's side - seemingly without knowing that's what he's doing.

"Brett?" he asks.

"Yeah?" Brett replies. Liam sounds kind of apprehensive, so he does his best to keep his voice neutral. Calm. "What's up?" 

"When am I gonna stop dreaming about it?"

Brett looks at Liam, who looks vaguely distressed. "Wish I knew," Brett murmurs sympathetically. "But... I can tell you that they aren't gonna stop until you manage to sit down and work through it somehow. It doesn't have to mean talking to me. But that's the only way you're gonna feel a little better about it." 

There's a long pause. Liam pokes at the fire. 

"I don't know how to talk about it," he says confusedly. "I really don't. I'm not - I'm not trying to keep things from you, I just don't..." He trails off, looks at Brett, and shrugs helplessly. 

"Could you write about it?" Brett asks.

Liam wrinkles his nose. "Like a journal?" he asks reluctantly.

"Doesn't have to be a journal. Just write a couple of lines about what you're thinking when it comes up." 

"That sounds like a journal."

Brett sighs, looks at Liam, and smiles. "There's no one to judge you, Li," he says. "And I'm not gonna read it. Unless you want me to." 

"I'd rather talk about it than write about it," Liam mumbles. "Otherwise it feels like... I don't know."

Brett nods. He's not entirely sure what Liam means, but he's got the gist of it. Liam's still young, and like most kids growing up now, the apocalypse interrupted a lot of emotional development that might've taken place in the last few years. Liam doesn't always have the words to articulate how he feels. 

"Otherwise it feels like it's something to hide?" Brett guesses. "Like it should be kept a secret?"

Liam nods, expression grateful. 

"Can I ask you something?" Brett asks. "You don't have to answer."

"Go for it," Liam says, slightly uneasily.

"How did you get away?" Brett asks. That's the main thing he can't quite work out in his mind - how Liam managed to gain the upper hand for even a second long enough to get away and across the other side of the room. "What happened after he attacked you?"

"He uh." Liam rubs his face. "So I dropped my crossbow, 'cause I was trying to get to the knife in my boot, but he charged me. He slammed me up against those broken shelves you saw - that's how I hurt my back - and after that he kind of just dropped me. I was kinda stunned and he got his arm around my neck - I was holding his wrist - and had a knife at my throat. But uh, he was kind of weak, because he had the same thing you had."

There's a long pause; Liam looks pretty troubled, but not like he's stopping, so Brett gives him a moment.

"He told me to stay still," Liam says. "That he wasn't going to kill me just then. Anyway, I did stay still, because I didn't want him to slit my throat - and he... he was reaching down, um, undoing his belt and zipper, and he wasn't holding me tight enough. So I kind of wrenched myself sideways and that's how I got the cut on my arm. But I got away."   
Liam shakes his head then. "It wasn't because I got the upper hand," he mutters. "I just got lucky."

"It doesn't matter how you got away," Brett says. "You did and he's dead." 

Liam swallows. "I watched that guy bleed to death, Brett. He was reaching out like he wanted help or something. I watched him die." 

"Liam..." Brett thinks about to go ahead with what he's about to say. "You can't keep carrying the guilt around, okay? You didn't kill him. The zombie did. And if it hadn't, it could've been much worse for you... and anyone else he came across, okay? He's probably done it before and he would've done it again." 

"But he came from a community," Liam argues weakly. "How could he have gotten away with it there?" 

"Maybe no one said anything," Brett says. "Liam, what happened to him wasn't your fault. It was his. He signed his own death warrant." 

"I could've at least put him down," Liam mumbles. "Instead of letting him bleed to death."

"Liam, you..." Brett shakes his head. "You were hurt, you were scared, you - look, I don't know what was going through your head. But none of this... you shouldn't feel guilty about any of this, alright? I know you do, but just know... you don't have to. You didn't do anything wrong." 

Liam nods silently.

Brett sighs. "Anyway," he says, trying to inject some cheeriness into his voice. "What would my sorry ass have done if you didn't come back?" 

Liam smiles a little. It's nice to see, and he's trying, so Brett leaves him alone after that - figures Liam probably needs some time to clear his head and process what they've just talked about. Still, he feels like he's making headway, and that's good. 

He doesn't pay much attention to what Liam's doing until Liam disappears for a few minutes, and then yelps in what seems like startled pain. Brett's up and moving before he's even calling Liam's name out.

He rounds the corner to the bathroom, finds Liam standing there with the water running and a hand over his neck, looking surprised. "Um," he says, beginning to turn pink.

"Jesus," Brett breathes. "You scared me. What're you doing?"

That's when he notices the razor in the sink and makes the connection between that and Liam's hand, over his neck. He's trying to shave, Brett realises. Without shaving cream.  
"The hair's uncomfortable," Liam explains, clearly embarrassed and self-conscious. "And it's really patchy and gross looking and-"

"You need shaving cream," Brett murmurs. "Want some help?"

Liam nods, and Brett leans down, gets the can of shaving cream out of the bathroom cupboard. He shakes it up as Liam watches curiously.

"Didn't you ever watch your stepdad do this?" Brett asks him gently.

"No," Liam mumbles. "I was too young to care."

"Fair enough." Brett sprays the foam onto his hands and, after a moment's hesitation - because something about it feels strangely intimate - he begins smoothing it down over the sparse hairs on Liam's cheeks, chin and jaw. "Like this," he says, mostly to distract himself from the fact that he's essentially caressing Liam's face. 

"Okay," he says. "Where's the razor?"

Liam motions to the sink; Brett picks it up, tilts Liam's jaw so his left side is facing Brett. "Like this," he murmurs again. "There."

A clean, smooth line blooms on Liam's cheek; Brett smiles. "This is easy." 

"For you, maybe," Liam says.

"It's just because it's the first time. The hairs are soft." Brett keeps going with what he's doing; Liam doesn't seem to mind. "Once you're older and you have to do it more, that won't happen."

"How long will that take?"

Brett shrugs. "Could be a while," he says.

They stand in silence for a while; when Brett's done, Liam bends down and washes his face, wincing at the pull in the cut on his neck. Brett presses a tissue to it and stops to really look at Liam.

Jesus, he thinks, stunned. Liam looks much more his age with a clean-shaven face; his jawline is still evident, but not nearly as pronounced when it's hairless, and his skin is smooth and shiny like it never had hair in the first place. 

"What?" Liam asks softly.

"Nothing, you just..." Brett swallows, taking in the softness of Liam's cheeks and face. "You just look so young," he admits.

Liam goes a little red. "I'm not... that young," he protests quietly. "I'll be eighteen soon I think." 

Brett shakes his head. "I never said it was a bad thing," he rebukes gently.

"It is a bad thing." Liam looks vaguely distressed. "If I'd been a little older or a little taller or a little less obviously a teenager, that Keeper might've left me alone. If I'd just looked more like you-"

"Liam," Brett interrupts. "Liam, what he did? That's not on you. It isn't your fault, okay?" Brett shakes his head. "If you hadn't been - if he hadn't wanted what he did, he probably would have killed you on sight. You know that, right?" 

"I... yeah," Liam mumbles. "Yeah, I suppose so, I just..."

"You don't think it was your fault, do you?" Brett asks quietly.

"I dunno. No." Liam seems to be telling the truth about that, at least. "Has it stopped bleeding?"

Brett lifts the tissue and inspects Liam's neck. "Yeah, I think you're good." He leans back and tries to smile. "You've gotta go with the grain on the first pass. Otherwise you yank the hairs and end up cutting yourself." 

"Bet you never thought you'd be teaching a seventeen year old how to shave, huh?" Liam mumbles self-consciously. He's moved to take the tissue, has his hand clamped down over the cut on his neck like he's trying to hide it. 

"Bet you never thought you'd have to continually rescue my sorry white ass from the snow, huh?" Brett counters. 

Liam smiles. It seems like it takes him a lot of effort, but it's there, so Brett's not gonna look the gift horse in the mouth, so to speak. At least Liam's not in one of those moods where he refuses to be cheered up or consoled. Those moods are the hardest for Brett to deal with - he can't help but feel personally offended whenever Liam refuses his help. 

"Gotta go out today," Liam says.

"Why?" 

"We need more iodine tincture, and that hole in the roof looks like it's gonna be a problem again real soon," Liam says, turning to look at it. "Short trip, anyway."

Brett nods. "You wanna split up?" he asks. "You can get the iodine; I'll grab the other stuff."

Liam frowns. "The hardware is way further than the iodine," he protests.

"Yeah, same direction though, right? When you've got the iodine, start heading to the hardware store - meet me halfway. It'll only be, what, half an hour apart?" 

Liam nods, licking his lips. And that's how they end up trekking through the snow, with Liam grumbling incessantly about the cold. Brett doesn't mind too much; he'd rather listen to Liam grumble than hear him silent, which never means anything good. 

Eventually, they reach the outdoors store. Liam hesitates out the front.

"I'll come with you," Brett offers.

He's expecting Liam to snap and rebuke him, and is surprised when Liam doesn't; he looks inside, sighs, and smiles a little, saying, "It's okay. Gotta do it sometime, right?"

"Yeah, but not right now," Brett says. "Not if you're not ready."

Liam shrugs. "I'm as ready as I'll ever be." He slaps Brett's chest lightly. "See ya soon."

"Yeah," Brett says. "Stay safe."

"You too," Liam calls as he heads into the store.

Brett watches for a moment, but Liam seems to know where he's going - he's striding forward confidently - and so he turns around and heads for the hardware store.

He makes it there in one piece, but something feels amiss. He thinks about backing out, going to find Liam - but Liam's already on his way here, probably, and Brett still has to find the stuff. He's been paranoid since Liam's little misadventure, anyway.

He finds some more of the insulation material first - he doesn't know where anything is, really, so he's wandering up and down the huge, empty aisles aimlessly, thoroughly creeped out by the sound of his own footsteps.

He finally finds the plywood Liam used last time and stops.

It's only a split second, but he catches it - the shuffle of someone else halting straight after him.

Brett freezes, his body doused in nerves and adrenaline. He wonders, briefly, if it might be Liam - but no, Liam wouldn't ever sneak up on him like this. He wouldn't think that was funny, especially considering Brett's armed and getting to be a good shot with a gun.

It's not Liam. Brett didn't see anyone coming in, and didn't see any tracks here before him. The person was either already in here for a while, or they followed him in and have been stalking him ever since. Which could very well mean they know Liam's also on his way.

He's not sure what to do. Liam's a pretty fucking good shot with his crossbow, but Brett also doesn't know how far away he is - he'd say twenty minutes, but Liam moves more slowly in the cold than he does when it's warmer out. Besides, Liam might not even want to shoot whoever it is. No matter how terrifying a pissed-off Liam is, he knows Liam doesn't even like killing the game he catches.

_If he thought your life was at risk, he would,_ Brett tells himself. But he can't rely on Liam showing up anytime soon.

That's when he has the sudden terrifying thought that whoever this is may have targeted Liam first. It would make sense; Liam's smaller, younger, less likely to be able to physically defend himself. He wishes he had a cell phone, or a radio, or some way of knowing if Liam's okay, but he doesn't.

He realises he's been standing still for a few too many seconds, now, and gets moving, his mind racing. He keeps his pace aimlessly and meandering, hoping his stalker doesn't cotton on to the fact that Brett knows he's there.

Plywood and insulation - check. Now he needs nails. Maybe some cloth or something to cover the opening. A ladder, even, if he can manage it. 

He rounds the corner, noticing too late that there are shoeprints on the ground, and looks up just in time to see a grizzled beard, long, wild gray hair, and a menacing sneer directed at him.

"Hi," the man says. "My name's Trent."

Brett opens his mouth, but in the next second, the butt of a gun flashes towards his face, and then he knows nothing.

~*~

"... kid, you know? Real smart."

Brett lifts his head groggily. 

His first instinct, even before his vision clears, is to jerk his arms and legs. They're both bound, tightly, with ridiculous amounts of thick nylon rope. 

He tries to speak, but there's a gag in his mouth. As his vision steadies and the blur fades, he suddenly remembers - splitting up with Liam, going to the hardware store, the man.   
Liam. He panics straight away; what happened to Liam?

He looks around, as much as he can, but he can't see any sign of Liam here. That doesn't mean he isn't here, but something in Brett's chest loosens a little.

Next: where is here?

He looks around again, properly, even though his head is throbbing. There are metal and wooden beams all around the room, a high ceiling, carts and machinery. Some kind of factory, Brett guesses. Nearby him is a table, laid out with his weapons, pack, and a medkit that isn't his.

"Hey!"

He gasps as his captor kicks him, brutally hard, in the thigh. "Hey," he says indignantly. "You listening to me?" 

Brett glares at him. 

The man kneels down. "You remember my name?" he asks pleasantly, jerking the gag out of Brett's mouth.

Brett swallows, still glaring. "Trent," he says. "You fucker." 

"Oh, that's not nice." Trent sits down. "What's your name, kid?"

"None of your goddamn fucking business." _I sound like Liam_ , Brett realises belatedly. _Guess he rubbed off on me as much as I rubbed off on him._

"Right." Trent yawns. "You might as well tell me. Till your little friend gets here, I'm the only company you've got."

Brett's gut twists, hearing Trent refer to Liam as his "little friend" with the implications he's using behind the words. 

"How old is he, by the way?" Trent asks. "Didn't get a good look at him. Fifteen? Sixteen?"

Brett says nothing. He's not sure if admitting Liam's real age will put him in more danger or help him in the long run. He's sort of glad, now, that Liam's height makes his age kind of ambiguous.

"Alright, don't tell me," Trent says with a shrug. "Where is he, anyway?"

"I was gonna ask you the same question," Brett says coldly. "What'd you do to him?"

"Me? Nothing. We've seen that kid shoot; nothing I wanna deal with."

When the fuck did they see Liam shoot? Brett wonders frantically. How long have they been watching us? Who the hell are they?

"Wherever your friend is," Trent says with a cold, emotionless smile, "I'm sure we'll see him soon, right?"

"He's gonna come find me," Brett says, wincing as he shifts - the blow to his leg didn't do him much good. "And when he does he's gonna be pissed."

Trent snorts. "He's a kid. Besides, my partner will find him." 

"Partner?" Brett asks, filled with dread. 

"Yeah. I got a buddy." Trent smiles nastily. "He has a thing for pretty guys. Like your friend." 

Brett's ears start ringing with anger, but he doesn't say anything as Trent continues. "He's hunkered down in that place you both go to a lot," he says. "That chemist's or whatever. He knows I was gonna take you down. Your friend's gonna be on his own." 

Brett blinks. "How long has it been since you saw him?" 

Trent shrugs. "A while now. But you know, he takes opportunities where he can and all that."

Brett wonders if they're lucky enough that Trent's buddy is the Keeper Liam encountered in the pharmacy a while ago. Maybe, just maybe... 

"Dunno why you haven't tried anything yet," Trent says. "The ladies are hard to find. Times like this'd turn anyone gay, right? And it's not like he could fight you off."

"He's my friend," Brett spits. "And I'm not a rapist."

"Rape is a harsh word," Trent says. 

"Yeah? That's because it's fucking twisted," Brett snaps.

Trent shrugs. "You do what you gotta do, man. We got needs, you know?"

"Sex isn't a need," Brett says. "It's a want. As for raping children, well, that's a whole different can of worms. What's in it for you, huh? You let him rape the kids, and then what?"

"It's not really about kids," Trent explains, like he's talking about the football. "It's more about whoever's there at the time. You're probably lucky he decided he wanted your buddy more than you. Kids are easier targets, that's all. As for what's in it for me..." 

He trails off. Brett waits for him to finish, but he doesn't. Just turns to Brett and smiles a little. 

"You hungry?"

"Fuck you," Brett says.

"That's not very polite." Trent stands up and goes to the fire, where there's meat roasting. "You sure? Come on. Could be your last meal." 

"Fuck you," Brett says again.

Trent comes closer with some meat, speared onto a stick, and puts it beneath his nose. Brett tilts his head away, feeling nauseous; the meat doesn't smell like any Liam's caught them before. Not rabbit or squirrel, definitely not deer, which Brett is used to by now. 

And that's when things suddenly make sense; why Trent works with the Keeper that tried to rape Liam, what he gets out of it. His stomach turns, and then he's throwing up to the side, almost on the meat.

Trent delivers a jarring blow to his side. "You almost ruined dinner," he snaps. "Good one."

"You're cannibals," Brett croaks.

"Well, yeah. Loads of people are now." Trent takes a bite out of the meat. "Suit yourself," he says. "It's pretty good." 

"Your friend's dead," Brett says coldly.

Trent pauses.

"Yeah." Brett shifts uncomfortably; his bruises are throbbing. "He ran into Liam a while ago. Bit off way more than he could chew. Did you know he had that flu shit? Zombie got him. He bled to death." 

"You're lying."

"What do I have to gain by lying? Sure would explain why you haven't seen him in a while." 

Trent stands up, starts pacing. "There's no way that kid would've-"

"He didn't," Brett says coldly. "Aren't you listening to me? It was a zombie. Got bit on the shoulder and bled to death, right after trying to rape my friend, which, I gotta say, is probably the best fuck you I've ever seen karma deliver."

He grunts in pain as Trent kneels down swiftly, grabbing his hair and slamming his head back against the pole behind him. "You think this is the end of the road for your friend?" he hisses.

Brett glares.

"It's not, kid." Trent tightens his grip. "You? We don't give a fuck about you. You're only worth your weight in meat, which is exactly why you're fucking here. Your friend? All young and healthy and good looking? He's worth a hell of a lot to the right people. He's got a lot further to go, kid. And you aren't gonna be there with him."

Brett makes the vague connection, somewhere, in a haze of fear, that he's going to essentially be dog food, and, even further off, that Liam's going to get sold into slavery, somehow. He can't let that happen. But he doesn't know how to stop it.

"You really think we're alone in this?" Trent asks. "We aren't. We got a lot of bidders who will pay for exactly what your friend is - young. Small. Pretty. They'll pay whatever price we set. We don't want you. We want him. You just happened to be the quickest way to achieve that goal."

"I'm gonna fucking kill you," Brett snarls.

"Good luck." Trent's jerking the gag back into his mouth. "Say goodnight, kid. When you wake up, we're gonna have your friend trussed up nice and clean in front of you. And we're gonna make him watch us beat you to death."

Brett opens his mouth to protest, struggles, but Trent's pulling out his gun again - Brett tries turning his head away from the blow, but he knows it's fruitless, and he only clings to consciousness for seconds after the impact before sliding into the dark.

~*~

The first thing he sees, coming to, are his own feet.

He groans; his head is aching like a bitch, and he feels pretty disoriented. He doesn't know how long he's been here, but his mouth is dry and his stomach is in knots with how hungry he is. 

He remembers what Trent told him about Liam and wants to cry. He knows Liam's going to come for him, no matter how long it takes - and when he does, he's going to be ambushed, dehumanised, sold, for fuck's sake, like a fucking animal-

He looks around. Trent's not in the room, so if Brett's gonna make his escape, it has to be now. He turns his neck a little, feels dried blood crackling down his skin. 

He struggles against the bonds, but all he does is succeed in giving himself rope burn. He could cry. He needs to get out of here, needs to warn Liam somehow, protect him-

There's a faint noise across the room; Brett whips his head up.

He spots Liam's crossbow first, then the rest of him - blue jeans, his usual plaid jacket, hair tucked beneath a beanie with only a few strands poking out. Liam's watching him, wide eyed and looking pretty fucking worried. 

He tries to shake his head, but with the blood on his face and the gag in his mouth, he knows there's no way Liam won't come to his aid.

Sure enough, Liam's looking around, then darting out from the shadows and across the room. He skids to a halt in front of Brett, drops to his knees, and whispers, "Jesus Christ, I thought-"

Then he's beginning to pull the gag off Brett's mouth. "I'm gonna get you out of here," he whispers. "Are you hurt? Do you think you can walk?"

"Yeah, Liam, you can't be here, he's gonna come back," Brett croaks. "Liam, please-"

"So? When he does I'll fucking shoot him." Now Liam's working at the bindings on his wrists. "Fuck, he trussed you up real tight, huh? You're gonna have bruises for ages." Liam's gritting his teeth; Brett wants to ask him how he even knew where he was, but he doesn't. He just wants to get out of here. 

"Where is he?" Liam asks. "Do you know where he went?"

"He's probably still here somewhere," Brett croaks. "Liam, seriously, you can't be here - he was friends with that Keeper who tried to rape you and he - they wanna try and-" He doesn't want to tell Liam what they want to do to him, with him. 

Liam's staring at him, looking worried. "Do you have a concussion?" he asks. "You aren't making any sense. Who's they?" Liam's still sawing at the bindings on his wrists. "You look terrible," he says. "Did he give you food?"

"He tried to," Brett rasps. "I refused."

Liam frowns. "That was dumb."

"No, it wasn't, I-" And that's when he sees the flash of a gun in the darkness. "Liam, look out!"

Liam ducks just in time for a bullet to whizz past his head and shatter the wooden beam next to him. "What-"

Trent's already across the room, and by the time Liam turns, a hand on his knife, Trent's bringing the butt of the gun down on top of Liam's head. Liam drops like a ton of bricks, hitting the ground next to Brett and rolling onto his back dazedly.

"No," Brett moans as Trent grabs Liam and starts hauling him across the floor. "No, don't hurt him. Don't - I'll do anything you want me to, just don't hurt him!"

Trent makes a low growling noise, abandoning Liam in the middle of the room as he heads back to Brett. "I don't want to hurt him," he snarls as he yanks the gag back up and forces it into Brett's mouth. "I want to kill him." 

Brett yells against the gag, but there's nothing he can do - his wrists are still bound tightly and struggling is fruitless. Even as he watches, Liam's slowly trying to get to his feet, still looking like he's on the brink of unconsciousness.

"You killed my friend," Trent bellows. Then he's sending a kick at Liam's ribs, and Liam yelps like a wounded animal, a noise that goes straight through Brett's heart. "You fucking killed him! I went to the chemist's, I wanted to see if it was true-"

_I shouldn't have told him_ , Brett thinks wildly. Liam's struggling to get up, but he's holding his ribs protectively and that can't be good. _He might've wanted to rape and sell Liam before, but at least he would've lived - now he's going to beat him to death and I can't do anything-_

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Trent bellows. "Get up and fight like a fucking man!"

Liam starts getting to his feet, wobbling coltishly. Brett wishes, more than anything, that he could get in there instead, take Liam's place - take the inevitable curb-stomp thrashing for him.

He listens to every one of Liam's painful, laboured breaths, looking around for some kind of weapon Liam could use, anything that might be useful in the fight. All he can see is the weapons on the table, Liam's abandoned crossbow - both too far away for Liam to feasibly get to without being shot - and a brick, lying nearby. 

"What've you got to say, huh?" Trent roars. "What've you got to fucking say?"

Liam lifts his head; he's bleeding, and the beanie's come off somewhere in the fight. "He tried to kill me first," Liam snarls. "Payback's a bitch." 

With that, Trent swings, almost catching Liam in the face but missing as Liam ducks and drives his shoulder into Trent's stomach. The wind leaves him in a rush, and Brett sees Liam yank the gun out of Trent's jeans.

He's aiming it when Trent straightens and pulls out a knife, and that's when Brett starts to get really worried - he sees it flash through the air a few times before Liam tosses the gun and grabs Trent's wrist, driving his body forward and managing to disarm him with the help of one of the metal beams in the room.

That leaves him open, though; in the next second, Trent's elbow is smashing into Liam's nose, and there's blood gushing everywhere. Liam's still reeling when Trent lunges at him.

Brett watches as they go down, as Liam somehow manages to wrangle himself so that he's got a hand pressed against Trent's shoulder, even as Trent's arm comes down on his throat and starts to press. Liam gasps, and Brett howls behind his gag.

If Liam dies in front of him, it'll destroy him. No questions asked. If Liam dies and then gets eaten by this sick fuck, and Trent makes him watch-

"Give it up, kid," Trent snarls.

Liam's got blood streaming out of his nose and mouth, from somewhere in his hair - but he's got a knife at Trent's throat and his eyes are alive with fury.

"You wouldn't," Trent sneers.

Liam does nothing. Brett wriggles furiously against the rope on his wrists, but Trent's trussed him up pretty good, and he can barely move, let alone fathom getting out of them. He's relieved Liam at least seems to have an advantage at the moment, but he's not convinced it'll last.

Even as he watches, Trent presses his arm down against Liam's throat. Liam tilts his neck back, making a guttural choking noise, his eyes narrowing. 

"You want it, huh?" Trent asks. "Do you want it more than me, though?" 

Brett wants Liam to realise that there's a brick right next to him, but he can see that Liam's other hand is pushing against Trent's shoulder, trying to keep Trent's weight off him, while his left hand has the knife at Trent's throat. 

_How can I help him?_ Brett wonders frantically. He can see that Liam's strength is fading - if he's going to do something, it has to be soon, or Liam won't be able to hold Trent off him for much longer. 

Just as he's thinking it, Liam's eyes skitter over to Brett. He leaps on the opportunity - he flicks his eyes at the brick, then at Trent's head. Trent's so focussed on choking Liam that he doesn't notice them communicating. 

Liam squints. Brett repeats the action, his eyes lingering on the brick, hoping that Liam gets the point - that he understands there's something there he can easily bash Trent sideways with. If Liam uses enough force, he could easily knock Trent out with that thing - even kill him. 

He wants to tell Liam that he only needs a split second to grab the brick and use it. But Liam's the one pinned down, fighting for air, and Brett has no idea how much strength Liam's got left, if any, or whether he even really knows what Brett's getting it. 

Trent presses down again.

Everything happens in the blink of an eye - Liam lets go of Trent's shoulder and grabs the brick, smashes him so hard and fast in the temple Trent doesn't have time to react to what's happening, and moves the knife before it can slit Trent's throat. Brett squirms furiously as Trent's weight drops on top of Liam, who's gone suddenly still.

He tries calling Liam's name behind the gag, but all that comes out is a frenzied, muffled noise. It works, though; Liam shifts, minutely, and begins shoving Trent's body off him. It takes him a while - Brett guesses he's exhausted from the fight - but eventually Liam's rolling over, away from Trent's body, and standing up. 

He wobbles on his feet, and Brett lurches forward against his restraints, his first instinct to go to Liam and support him. Not that he can move or anything.

Liam manages to stay upright, by some small miracle, and makes his way to Brett. There's blood dripping on the floor - Liam's face is covered in it, his hair bright and wet on the left side of his head.

The first thing Liam does, when he reaches Brett and squats exhaustedly next to him, is use his knife to slice through the bindings on Brett's feet, then on his arms. Brett's yanking the gag out of his mouth as soon as he can.

"Come here," is the first thing that comes out of his mouth; he pulls Liam in close, mindless of the blood all over him, and gives him a quick hug. "Okay, come on, you need to let me look at you."

"Are you hurt?" Liam croaks.

"No. I'm fine." Brett's just about to stand up when Liam's knees give, and he's down at the same level Brett is, suddenly. Brett reaches out, on instinct, catches Liam's smaller body by his waist and ribs to support him.

"Liam?" he asks worriedly. "Liam, hey. Hey. Look at me, buddy."

He moves his left hand to touch Liam's face. When he does, and his hand makes contact with Liam's skin, a bright red smear appears on his jaw. Liam's looking at him, breathing hard, eyes still stuck in fear.

Brett looks back down at Liam's side, where he caught him, and swallows, reaches down to lift the hem of his shirt.

There's blood running down Liam's skin in bright red patches, coming from a stab wound, an inch and a half across, nestled just under Liam's ribs. "Oh," Brett breathes. "Oh, sh-"

Liam makes an inhuman, animalistic noise of pain and fright, raises his hand to press down on the wound. Blood starts seeping between his fingers, and Brett thinks, Liam's been stabbed. Trent stabbed him. He's hurt bad this time.

"Liam-"

"Oh, _fuck_ ," Liam moans. 

"Okay," Brett says, feeling lightheaded. "Okay, don't panic, okay? Don't panic. Let me look at you-"

"What do you mean, _don't fucking panic_?" Liam whimpers.

"Come on, Liam, let me look - sit. Sit down. There you go."

Once Liam's sat down - shaking violently - Brett pulls the shirt away more, so he can get a better look at the stab wound. He knows it's a stab wound because it's bleeding - not profusely, but more than what a cut would warrant - and because Liam's going into shock right in front of him.

"When did this happen?" Brett demands. "When did he stab you?"

"I don't know." Liam's breathing is fast. "Brett, it feels really bad." 

"Yeah, I know, I know, uh - stay here, okay?" He knows Trent has a medkit, because he saw it. "Look, Trent's got medicine, I'm gonna go find it. Stay still." He grabs Liam's hand and presses it down over the wound site. "Keep pressure on it. Don't let up, okay?" 

Liam nods, and Brett gets to his feet, searching desperately for the medkit. It doesn't take him long to find - it's the only white thing amongst everything else. 

He hurries back to Liam, who's managed to slump down against the pole. Brett tries to plan out what he's going to do here - eventually, he settles on emergency first aid, then home, then more extensive first aid, because Trent might wake up and if he does they're fucked.

_Liam's going to bleed to death if you don't help him_ , he thinks, panicking. _Liam might bleed to death even if you do try to help. Liam could die today. He could die in the next five minutes, or the next hour._

He's not even sure Liam's going to be able to move after this. He'll cross that bridge if he comes to it, though. 

He lifts Liam's shirt up, tries to inspect the wound. It's just under Liam's ribs - and Liam's not coughing blood, which has to be good, because that means it hasn't perforated his lungs or organs - that Brett can tell, anyway. But he can't tell how deep the wound is and Liam already seems to have lost a lot of blood. 

"Okay," he says shakily. "You know what we're gonna do, Li?"

"What're we gonna do?" Liam breathes.

"We're gonna patch you up here," Brett rambles, "best we can. Then we're gonna get you up, somehow, and get you back to our apartment. And once we're there, we're gonna get you all cleaned up and stitched and re-bandaged. And you're gonna be fine."

Liam nods. 

"Tell me how you found me," Brett says as he works at getting Liam's wound covered. "It can't have been easy."

"It actually - kinda was," Liam pants. "He doesn't - cover his tracks well. And you - you struggled. Left lots of marks." 

"Glad to know I could help." Brett shakes his head; he doesn't remember struggling, but maybe he was half-conscious and able to. "I can't believe you won that fight," he breathes out. "Seriously."

"Did I really win?" Liam croaks. "I mean I got stabbed."

"You're conscious, he's not and I'm not tied up anymore. You won. Hold still." Brett starts looping the bandages around Liam's middle. After that, he looks into Liam's face. Liam looks back at him, eyes alert and focussed.

"I need you to be honest with me," Brett says. "Okay? No bullshit. Do you think you can walk?"

There's a moment of silence. Then, eventually, Liam says, "If you help me I can."

"Okay. For how long?"

"I don't know." 

Brett nods. "Okay. Let's get you upright."

"My crossbow-"

"I'll get it. Promise. Come on."

He manages to get Liam upright, goes and retrieves his crossbow. Then, after a moment, he turns back to Trent.

"What're you doing?" Liam coughs.

Brett loops the rope around Trent's wrists and feet. "Making sure he's not a problem anymore," he snarls. "He's lucky I'm not killing him here and now."

Once he's sure the ties are secure, he heads over to Liam and pulls Liam's arm around his shoulder. "Come on," he murmurs. "Easy. I'll match your pace, okay?"

Liam nods, beginning to walk at what Brett thinks is a pretty good pace, considering he's just been stabbed. He can only hope this means that Liam isn't as badly hurt as all the blood would suggest. 

"How far are we from home?" Brett asks.

"Not far," Liam pants. "A mile. Maybe."

"You gonna make it that far?"

"I sure hope so," Liam breathes. "Don't recall - a med station - in the middle of the snow." 

Brett looks down at Liam's side. "How's that feeling?" he asks.

"Terrible," Liam pants. "But I'm alive, right?"

"If you feel like you're gonna pass out, you have to tell me, alright?" When Liam nods, Brett hoists him closer, using the belt loops of Liam's jeans to hold him tight. "What's it feel like? Explain it to me."

"Like I got fucking stabbed," Liam groans.

"Okay, yeah," Brett says, trying not to lose patience. He knows Liam isn't being difficult on purpose. He reminds himself that Liam's in pain, frightened, and having to trek through the snow to get to safety, and that's gotta suck. "But what can you really feel? Can you tell me?"

He's startled when Liam gives a low whimper of pain, right in his ear. "Liam-"

"It feels - I don't know, I don't - it's not that deep, I don't think, but maybe - I'm bleeding pretty badly."

Brett realises, right around then, that Liam's stammering speech and disjointed thoughts are due to shock. He's not going to be able to tell Brett anything useful like this, but Brett resolves to keep him talking anyway, hoping that it'll keep Liam conscious for a while longer.

"Yeah? Are you hurt anywhere else?" 

"I don't - I don't think so, he kicked me in the ribs a few times but - I can't really feel much else."

"That's because you're going into shock," Brett says, gritting his teeth. "Look, I think we're almost back, okay? Can you keep walking? Or do you need me to carry you?"

"I can keep walking," Liam breathes weakly. 

"Liam-"

"I can keep walking." 

And so they keep trudging through the snow. It's slow-going, and Liam's grip on his shoulders is tight, body trembling from a combination of the snow and blood loss. Brett doesn't have any way to fix that, so he knows he has to stop the bleeding. 

He stops, and Liam staggers to a halt beside him. "Can you get on my back?" he asks.

"Huh?" Liam croaks.

"Can you get on my back? I need to stop you losing blood, and that's not gonna happen if you're walking around and panting like that."

"Um." Liam's leaning against him. "If you bent down, maybe?"

Brett does as he's told after helping Liam get the crossbow around his chest, feels Liam's hands on his shoulders. "Just one jump and you're golden," he says. "You can do it." 

Liam jumps onto his back, and for a moment, they scramble for balance - Liam's heavier than Brett remembers him being, although that could be the weight of the crossbow, and Liam seems to be having a hard time gripping Brett tightly enough.

Eventually, though, they straighten out, Liam's arms around his neck and his thighs threaded between Brett's arms. "Okay," Brett pants. "You've got a job."

"I don't think I can do much right now," Liam rasps.

"That's okay, it's an easy job. Just keep talking to me, okay? Whatever comes to mind. Just don't stop talking."

"Why?"

"So I know you're conscious." Brett starts walking. "And to distract me." 

"When I was - I don't know, maybe fourteen - um, my mom, she got me into lacrosse. My stepdad suggested it. As an anger output or something." Liam's sentences are choppy, but he's talking, so Brett won't complain. "Anyway, I got pretty good at it. Pretty fast."

There's a pause; Liam seems to be wondering where to go next.

"My stepdad did lots for me," he says, voice quiet in Brett's ear. "He met my mom when I was ten. My real dad used to beat us up. I got taken to the hospital, busted ribs, you know, and my stepdad was the on-call doctor. I ended up telling him everything. Wasn't supposed to, but I was a kid. I got scared that my dad would kill my mom while I was in the hospital." 

Some of Liam's trust issues are starting to make sense to Brett now, but before he can dwell on it, Liam coughs a little. Brett listens; it sounds like a dry cough, but Liam's shaking pretty badly and he's still panting, even though he's not walking anymore. 

"Try breathing slower," Brett suggests, his own breathing hard. "Slow your heart rate down." 

"It's hard," Liam mumbles. "I'm trying." 

"Okay. Just keep trying. We're almost there. Hey, keep talking to me. Tell me about your mom."

"My mom?"

"Yeah. Tell me about her. What kind of mom was she?"

Liam coughs again; Brett desperately hopes there's no blood in it when he checks later. "She's sweet," Liam mumbles. "Really gentle. Kind of, I don't know, she didn't discipline me much. Especially after I got diagnosed with I.E.D. The doc told her disciplining me wouldn't help, because I wasn't acting out by choice."

"Yeah? What'd she do instead?"

"When I was a kid, she used to like - like I'd have a meltdown, break stuff, hurt myself sometimes, most of the time - and she'd just hold me. And sometimes she'd rock me, really slow, like I was a baby or something. To try and comfort me." 

Brett feels his heart tighten in sympathy. "She sounds great."

"She is," Liam murmurs. "Maybe I'll get to see her again someday." 

_What if this stab wound kills him?_ Brett wonders suddenly. _What if he bleeds out, or it's pierced an organ? What if it gets infected and I can't treat it? What if he never gets to see his mom again?_

He doubles his pace, listens to Liam's mumbling in his ear, and they're back in another ten minutes. The steps are rough with Liam on top of him, but he gets up them and opens the door to their flat, kneels in the middle of the room to let Liam off.

Liam staggers off him, and Brett manages to get him to the bed before he collapses. "Alright," he says, getting the crossbow off Liam's chest. "Okay, jacket off. That's it." 

Once he's got Liam out of his jacket, he spreads towels out over the bed and instructs Liam to lie down. He's terrified when, upon lying down, the bandage shifts upwards, and Liam writhes briefly in pain, causing the wound to pulse blood more quickly. He outright moans in pain, tries to curl up on his side.

_I've gotta keep him still_ , Brett panics. _I've gotta stop him from moving._

"Liam," he says, leaning over and pressing on Liam's shoulder. "Liam, you've gotta stay still. I know it hurts." He swallows; Liam's looking up at him and he's still straining against Brett's hand weakly. "Liam, I know it hurts," he says desperately. "I know you're in pain, baby. But you have to try and stay still. Otherwise you're going to lose blood faster." 

"I just wanna - be - fuck," Liam moans. He doesn't seem to notice the "baby" that slipped in there, which Brett is sort of grateful for.

"I know, I know." He smooths Liam's hair with one hand, uses his other to hold Liam's left thigh to the bed. "I know, you wanna curl up on your side, right? To ease the pain?" When Liam nods, Brett nods back. "You can't, okay? Look, I need to get it disinfected, then I need to stitch you up, put a new bandage on, and get some water into you. You can't curl up just yet. You'll adjust to being on your back, I promise. It won't hurt as much soon."

Liam seems to be trying to listen to him, at the very least, because he's not actively fighting Brett's hold anymore. He still looks panicky and disoriented, though, so Brett doesn't let him go, even though inside his head, he's screaming that he needs to get bandages on Liam's wound like an hour ago.

"Okay," he whispers soothingly. "Okay. You're okay. You're gonna be fine. I'm gonna get the stuff I need, okay? You're fine. I'll be back in thirty seconds." 

Liam nods, swallowing, and Brett stands up, grabs the medkit, some water, and a bottle of salt - they seem to be almost out of the disinfectant used for wounds. 

"What's that for?" Liam asks. His breathing is still fast, but not as bad as before, and he's not trying to roll around anymore either. He's eyeing the bottle of salt.

"Disinfecting it," Brett says. "And sterilising it." He cuts through the bandages on Liam's side and removes the gauze pad, horrified to find it heavy and saturated with Liam's blood. Liam looks too, paling at the sight.

"That's a lot of blood," he says uneasily.

"Nah, it's not even that bad," Brett lies, tossing the gauze and inspecting the wound. From the light in here, he can see that the wound is about an inch across, still oozing blood. But he can't tell how deep it is. 

"Okay," he says. "I need you to tell me where the pain is, as best you can."

"Um." Liam looks a little lost. "Just - the actual area. Not anywhere else. It's like this, um, this really deep muscular pain?" He closes his eyes, seems to be resisting the urge to wriggle around. "It hurts everywhere," he breathes.

"No stomach pain? You breathing okay?" He leans down and puts his head against Liam's chest; his heartbeat is fast, but steady, and his lungs sound clear. "No problems?"

"No," Liam says. "It's just the stab wound." Brett feels Liam's hand on his knee. "Can I have some Tylenol or something?" he breathes weakly. "I don't know if you've ever been stabbed, but it's not exactly a garden variety headache."

"Yeah, yeah, hang on." Brett grabs the Tylenol and water, helps Liam swallow them. "Alright," he murmurs, putting a cloth to Liam's mouth. "Cough for me."

Liam coughs, flinching, but no blood comes up, and he seems able to stop on his own. Brett finally thinks that maybe he's getting some good news - there's no internal bleeding that he can see evidence of, and Liam's breathing is clear. At the very least, his lungs are alright.

"So?" Liam asks.

"So you're all good. Hey, stay still," Brett pleads as Liam starts to move around. "I've gotta patch you up. Sterilisation first, okay?"

"Okay," Liam agrees.

Brett's fucking lucky that Liam's pretty cooperative and doesn't ask that many questions; he's had far worse patients. He gets to work quickly, because Liam's breathing sounds harsh and panicky, and there's a distinct whimper behind every breath he's taking. He can't leave Liam in pain like this.

"I still can't believe you attacked him," Brett murmurs as he starts dissolving the salt in warm water.

Liam smiles at him weakly. "Well, I mean, I don't mean to brag, but I do have an un-medicated, psychological anger disorder," he jokes. "I'm like the Hulk."

"You're the tiniest Hulk I've ever seen," Brett says. 

"Take it back," Liam breathes.

"Nope. Even if I did take it back - it's still true." Brett's finally satisfied with the water, pours it onto a rag. "Okay, look, this is gonna sting," he says hesitantly. "Just try to hold still."

"You got it," Liam says. "Just - do it fast." 

Brett nods. Then, after a moment, he takes a breath and presses the rag against Liam's wound.

He's not expecting Liam to jerk and give a startled cry of pain, and his first instinct is to pin Liam down by his shoulder. "Liam, stay still," he begs. "Please. You're gonna make it bleed more."

"I'm trying," Liam whimpers. "It fucking hurts, okay?" 

"I know it does." Liam's broken out into a cold sweat - a response to pain, Brett knows. "But you've gotta stay still, okay? Just try." He swallows. "The salt sterilises the wound," he says. "I don't know how it works, really." He holds Liam down harder when Liam starts straining against his touch, his neck arched towards the ceiling.

Brett continues nervously, hoping to distract Liam from the pain. He knows this shit burns. "But I do know that salt breaks down the ions in sodium and chloride, and the pain receptors in your nerves react to that stimuli pretty harshly."

"What the fuck are you talking about?" Liam chokes. "Okay, God, get that fucking thing off me!" 

Brett yanks the towel away, wincing. The salt seems to have caused Liam more pain than the actual stab wound. "Sorry," he breathes.

Liam's got an arm across his forehead, like he's trying to hide his face from Brett. "Fuck," he whispers brokenly. "That kills."

"I know, I know it sucks." Brett swallows, starts getting the needle and thread ready. "But if it stops you getting an infection, it'll be worth it." 

"If you say so," Liam breathes. He turns when he hears the clattering of Brett beginning to sterilise the needle. "Oh, come on," he says. "No."

"Liam," Brett pleads. "Come on. You have to let me help, okay? You can't keep bleeding like this. I have to stitch you up." 

Liam meets his eyes reluctantly. "Okay," he groans. "Okay, alright." 

"If it's any consolation, it won't be many," Brett says as he ties off the surgical thread.

"It's not," Liam says, swallowing. "Come on, let's just get it over with." 

"Alright," Brett says, but he still hesitates before he swiftly pushes the needle through Liam's skin.

Liam must be ready for it, because his body snaps into such a rigid position it may as well be the beginning of a seizure. He's trying not to move - Brett can see his eyes are watering almost uncontrollably. He doesn't blame him; stitches are painful at the best of times, but Brett hardly knows what he's doing and Liam's already in significant amounts of pain.

"Few more," Brett whispers soothingly. "Just a few more. Hey, tell me more about Garrett. How'd you guys end up together?"

He's worried Liam's not going to speak for a moment - and then he swallows convulsively and says, "School. We were on the lacrosse team. We-" Here, Liam's voice chokes and dies as Brett pushes the needle into him again. 

"We?" Brett prompts.

"We ended up being practise buddies," Liam gasps. "We were the same size."

"Yeah?" Brett asks desperately. "Same size, huh? He as little as you?"

Liam doesn't answer; he's pushed the heels of his hands into his eyes. And he didn't react this badly to having his arm stitched - although Brett hadn't just poured salt water on it, and it wasn't a stab wound, and, well, every variable is different in this case.

"I can't really imagine that," Brett says. "Bet he was bigger than you, huh?"

"Little." Liam's voice cracks.

"Yeah, thought so," Brett says, nodding to himself. "Was he your age?"

"Older," Liam pants. His breathing is laboured. "He was sixteen."

"Ah, you have a thing for older guys, huh? I always had a thing for older chicks. Not heaps older, I didn't wanna bang my friends' moms or anything like that, but yeah, I liked older girls."

"He was the only one," Liam gasps. "Fuck, please tell me you're almost done." 

"Just two more," Brett says desperately. "Come on, you can make it through two more."

"If you say so," Liam whimpers. "You're not the one-"

He stops talking as Brett pushes the needle through. And Brett's been stopping in between, giving Liam the chance to catch his breath, but he doesn't this time - he just goes straight ahead with the next stitch as Liam shudders underneath him.

"Okay," he breathes. "Done." Liam's dripping with sweat and blood; Brett's glad he had the sense to put towels down on the bed. He grabs a wet cloth and wipes Liam's face and neck. "Keep telling me about Garrett," he encourages.

"Please tell me you're done playing doctor," Liam whines, his voice almost a sob. There are tears rolling down the sides of his face, and his eyelashes are wet and spiky with them. Brett tries wiping them away, but they reappear almost immediately. 

"I just need to put a bandage on it, okay?" Brett whispers. "That shouldn't hurt too much. Not like the stitches." 

Liam's eyes roll to meet his; he looks miserable and strung-out and like he's on the verge of having a breakdown. Brett takes a spare moment to lean in close, picking up the saltwater rag and wetting it again. Liam doesn't seem to notice.

He lifts his free hand to Liam's hair; his hands are covered in blood, but so is Liam, so it's not a big deal. He starts stroking gently at the damp blonde strands. Liam relaxes under his touch, gradually, his breathing beginning to slow down. He doesn't say anything, but he looks grateful for the affection.

"You're doing a great job," Brett says kindly, somewhat awkwardly. As he does, he starts wiping at the stitches with the rag, wanting to disinfect them properly. Liam winces, but he doesn't struggle. "Seriously. You're a great patient."

"I haven't done anything," Liam pants back.

"You've been great," Brett reiterates. "I would've been bawling by now." 

"Come anywhere near me with that fucking needle again and I can't make any promises," Liam breathes. Brett cracks a smile.

"Sorry for swearing at you," Liam whispers.

"Don't be. I get it." Brett finishes up with the rag. "You okay here while I find a bandage?"

"Yeah, I'm alright." 

Brett stands up, goes and roots around in their medkit. He eventually finds a spare gauze pad, some medical tape, and some antiseptic spray.

"So," he says quietly. He sprays the area; Liam doesn't even flinch this time around, even though he looks uncomfortable. "You said Garrett was the only one."

Liam nods. "He was my first," Liam says. "I've never been with anyone else." 

Brett nods. "That... must really be painful for you," he says softly. "I'm sorry." 

Liam's quiet for a long moment; Brett thinks it's because he's in pain, but just as he's getting a clean cloth to wipe away all the blood and dirt, Liam swallows quietly and says - in a voice that's more a wavering, timid question than anything else - "The stab wound, and the stitches, and hurting my shoulder, and almost getting raped... nothing compares to it. Nothing." 

Brett feels his eyes sting; he finishes cleaning Liam's side up and begins prepping the gauze pad. "I'm sorry," he says again. "If there's anything I can do to make it easier-"

He's startled to find Liam's fingers tangling up with his. Liam's holding his hand and not letting go, so Brett squeezes his fingers. They're both bloody and bruised up, but Liam's alive and alright so far, and that's something to be thankful for.

Brett presses the gauze pad down and begins taping it in place. "How's it feeling?" he asks softly.

Liam nods. "Much better," he says, and Brett feels like he's talking about more than the stab wound. "You're a great doctor."

Brett smiles. "You weren't saying that ten minutes ago."

"Ten minutes ago, you were shoving a needle into me," Liam says. "I wouldn't take it personally. I'd hate anyone doing that." 

Brett nods and surveys Liam's body for a moment; his shirt is hiked up around his chest, but it's saturated with blood and torn - it's unsalvageable. He picks up a pair of scissors, not missing the way Liam tries to scoot away.

"What're you gonna do with those?" he asks, voice high-pitched.

"I'm gonna cut your shirt off you," Brett says. "So you don't have to move." He starts by straightening it out, then slicing it from hem to neckline. Liam holds absolutely still for him this time around.

Eventually, after a few more strategically placed snips, Brett's got the shirt in enough pieces that he can just pull it away from Liam's torso. All that's left now are his jeans - which, while they have some blood on them, can probably just be washed and reworn.

"Hey," he murmurs. "I wanna get you out of your jeans, okay? You think we can do that?"

Liam nods tiredly. "Mhm." 

Brett grits his teeth against the tears. He knows Liam's fucking exhausted, but he needs to make sure he does everything he can to make sure Liam lives. So he reaches down, unbuttons and unzips Liam's jeans, and begins sliding them down his hips.

Liam's breath catches as he tries lifting his hips up to help, and he sinks back against the bed, his eyes shut. Brett finishes what he was doing, grabs a blanket, and shakes it out. He pulls it over Liam's legs, sits back down, and picks up a clean rag.

"No," Liam moans. "No more fucking saltwater." 

"Shh," Brett says, unable to hide how distressed Liam's pain is making him. "No more salt water. I'm just gonna wipe you down, okay? I'm just gonna get you clean." 

Liam breathes out and nods. Brett swallows, wets the towel, gives Liam time to figure out where his hands are before starting to dab at Liam's face - it's covered in blood after the blow to his nose, which, upon inspection, doesn't seem broken. After a moment, hesitantly, he rests his free hand on Liam's ribcage. Liam looks pretty spooked, uneasy, and he's shaking under Brett's hands. Brett waits for a while, to see if Liam's going to calm down on his own or whether he needs some encouragement.

After a while, it becomes pretty clear to him that Liam's not going to stop shaking, so Brett begins talking in a low, soothing voice as he starts dabbing gingerly at Liam's nose. "That's it," he murmurs. "Easy. You're okay." 

Liam's trembling pretty violently, though, and he looks like he's at the end of his rope - not that Brett can blame him, exactly, because he is too.

He manages to get all the blood off Liam's face, wrings the rag out, and starts on his neck and chest. Liam heaves a shaky sigh, raises his hand, and tangles his fingers up with Brett's, on his ribs. 

"Thank you," he breathes. 

Brett sucks in a breath, trying not to cry. "You saved my life, Li." He wipes at his eyes. "Um, can I listen to your breathing? Is that okay?"

Liam nods. Brett leans down, puts his head gently against Liam's chest. Liam's lungs and heart still sound okay - overtaxed, but not like there's liquid surrounding them, and that's good. 

"Brett?"

He sits up. "Yeah? What do you need?"

"Can I have some water?" Liam croaks. "I'm really thirsty."

"Yeah. Yeah, hang on, I'll get you some." Brett goes to the table and finds some of their purified water, in a bucket, fills up a new water bottle and takes it back. "You need some help?" 

Liam shakes his head, and Brett hands the bottle over. Liam drinks thirstily, polishes off half the bottle before handing it back. 

"Can I finish cleaning you up?" Brett murmurs.

"Mhm." 

So he keeps going. Liam's got bruises and cuts and abrasions all over him from the fight - there's a nasty one coming up on his throat, from the choking, and another in the shape of a boot on his ribcage, but none of them even compare to the stab wound. 

"He could've killed you," Brett says quietly.

"Yeah. But he didn't."

_He tried_ , Brett thinks, taking in the array of cuts, scratches and bruises across Liam's chest and arms. _He almost did. An inch up, or to the left, or if the knife had been longer, sharper, if he'd twisted it... Liam would've bled out right there._

He's been wiping Liam down - slowly, gently - for about five minutes when he sees Liam's eyes flutter shut. Brett pauses what he's doing.

Liam cracks his eyes open again. "Sorry," he murmurs. "I'm sleepy."

"If you're sleepy, you should rest," Brett says. "I'll keep an eye on you. Clean you up a bit. Deal?"

"What's my end of the deal?" Liam mumbles.

"You make it through and get better," Brett says. "That's your job, okay? To get better."

Liam nods a little, then opens his eyes completely.

"Dunbar," he says.

"What's that?" Brett asks. 

Liam smiles weakly. "My last name," he says. "It's Dunbar." 

Brett can't help but smile back; he feels like the last piece of the puzzle that makes up Liam has just slid neatly into place. "Liam Dunbar," he muses. "I like it." Then, after rolling the name around in his head - Liam's always just been Liam to him - he says, "I'm Brett Talbot." 

"Talbot," Liam mumbles. "Anyone ever call you Talbutt?"

"Regularly," Brett says. "Don't think you're clever."

Liam smiles, but his eyes are shut again, and barely a minute later his breathing noticeably evens out, gets deeper. Brett sighs with relief. If there's anything Liam needs right now, it's a decent amount of sleep, some water, and, as Brett's mom would have put it, some TLC.

He picks up the salty rag. With Liam asleep, he finally gets the opportunity to clean up some of the bigger cuts on his torso, without it hurting Liam. He even manages to get some of the blood out of Liam's hair without him waking up. 

He lets Liam sleep for a couple of hours so he can take a look at his own injuries - which seem to be pretty superficial. After that, he cleans out all the towels he used on Liam, changes out the saltwater in case he needs more of it.

Finally, he sits down next to the bed and sniffs a little. He can't tell Liam the truth behind what Trent and the other Keeper were doing. Not now. And how is he supposed to say it anyway? _Hey, Liam, those guys who gave us trouble - they rape, kill and cannibalise their victims. How fucked up is that? Oh, also, they were going to sell you into a slave market._

He looks at Liam. His breathing is still kind of fast, but he is at least sleeping. Brett endeavours to get him properly cleaned up as soon as he can - maybe into a bath, if he's organised enough to make it warm. Even just getting Liam under a shower would do wonders for him, but right now, Liam can't walk, and Brett's not convinced that he can safely move Liam either - not without causing further injury to him. Jostling him too much could open the stitches, or deepen the wound, or cause more bleeding.

He wipes his eyes roughly and moves a little closer, pulls the blanket up around Liam. He knows he's not really meant to tuck it in - first aid dictates that he keeps the covering loose so Liam can move around - but Liam's shivering and Brett can't help it. He needs to do something, but he's already done everything he can. So, for now, gently tucking the corners of the blanket under Liam's arms and shoulders is gonna have to do.

Liam turns his head, registering the movement nearby; his eyelashes flutter a little before his eyes open, and he focusses slowly on Brett. "Hi," he murmurs.

Brett wipes his face again. "Hey," he says, voice breaking.

Liam looks up at him exhaustedly. "Why're you crying?"

"I'm not." Brett wipes his eyes again. "You're imagining things."

A soft smile plays around the corners of Liam's mouth; his eyes are closed again. "I'm not that out of it," he murmurs.

Brett shuffles a bit closer. "I'm just stressed," he says. "Don't worry about me, okay? Try to get some more rest if you can. The more of this you sleep through, the less pain you'll be in." 

"Mhm." Liam's fingertips find the edge of Brett's thigh. "You should rest too." 

Brett puts his hand on Liam's forehead, trying to soothe the little frown lines out of it. That's when he notices the heat coming off Liam's face. 

His stomach turns uneasily. Liam being warmer than usual doesn't have to mean an infection... but it probably does. He leans down, gives Liam a little shake on the shoulder to get his attention.

Liam's eyes open. "Yeah?"

"How're you feeling?" Brett asks gently.

Liam rolls his head to face Brett listlessly. "Crappy."

The knife would have been dirty, Brett realises. There's no way it was a sterile blade. 

"Okay," he says, trying to smile. "Look, I think you might be coming down with a fever or something. I'm gonna go find you some antibiotics or something. You reckon you're okay here for a little while?" 

"Yeah, but you can't go alone," Liam says, clearly distressed.

"And you can't come with me," Brett points out. "I won't be gone long." He sighs. "Look... if you have an infection, we need to treat it as soon as possible, okay?" He stands up. "Why don't you, um..."

Liam blinks at him, and Brett realises that Liam's pretty useless like this. But he can prop Liam up on his side, maybe, just so he doesn't choke if he gets sick.

"Alright," he says. "Here." He rolls Liam a little, trying to be gentle, and tucks some pillows up under his shoulder blade and waist. Then he grabs a bottle of water, some Tylenol, and a bucket - and, as an afterthought, Liam's glasses and House Of Leaves. "Here," he says. "Keep you entertained."

Liam still looks worried. "Brett-"

"I'll be fine, Li. Yeah? I'll be back before you have time to miss me." 

"I doubt that," Liam says.

~*~

Getting to the hospital is easy.

Even getting into the hospital is easy - the doors aren't barricaded anymore. Brett goes in, armed to the teeth, only to find it devoid of zombies. Plenty of mostly decomposed corpses, but devoid, from what he can see, of zombies.

_That's not fucking weird at all_ , he thinks dubiously as he begins to follow the arrows. He knows that going to the ICU will probably get him close to the two drugs he's looking for, as well as their equipment.

He's just turned a corner when he notices that there's a shuffling noise ahead. His chest fills with dread around the same time his eyes start to well up; he can't afford to be stopped by munchers, not now, not with Liam's fever raging completely out of control, unchecked and rampant. He needs to get back as soon as possible.

When he turns the corner, he sees two zombies, shuffling around aimlessly. He takes them out easily, using his machete on both of them - no sense making noise by wasting bullets.

Just as he's stepping over the bodies, he pauses. Both of them have blue ties around their necks, like that Keeper at the pharmacy did - like Trent did.

Trent. Brett feels a flare of rage. He wants to go back and shank Trent the way Trent did to Liam - to go back and pierce him, leaving him bleeding out like a deer. But Liam needs him more than Brett needs revenge.

He keeps heading down, and, eventually, comes across more Keepers. He can't help but wonder, as he puts down their zombified forms, what they were doing here - why there seems to be no other zombies as he progresses through the halls to the store rooms.

He shakes his head. It doesn't matter. What does matter is getting Liam the medicine he so desperately needs.

_Liam saved your life and now he's been stabbed and he's going to die_ , Brett thinks, feeling his throat close over. _Liam risked it all again and he's paying for it with his life this time._

There's no denying it; no matter how Brett tries to help, Liam might still die. In fact, there's a greater chance of him dying than there is of him making a full recovery. But Brett has to try. If he doesn't, he may as well have buried the knife in Liam himself.

His heart leaps when he finally spots the signs for the storerooms. With the hospital powered down, it's easy getting into them - and there's a veritable goldmine there once he does. He dumps his backpack and sheaths the machete, searching for what he needs.

Meropenem and Vancomycin. He swallows, trying to remember their other names, but he can't. His old group had a doctor that was teaching him this stuff, but this was pretty much as far as he got - this, and a few other rudimentary skills that might come in useful. He knows how to give a blood transfusion, but he doesn't have any blood to give to Liam, because he doesn't know if they're even the same type, let alone compatible.

Finally, he finds them - boxes of Vancomycin pills, on a top shelf. He sweeps as many as he can into the bag, along with bottles of codeine and antiseptic spray. Then he sets out to look for the Meropenem.

Meropenem. IV bag, needle, IV tubing, saline solution, Meropenem solution. It's a huge list, but he's on the right track once he finds the powdered Meropenem right next to its solution.

The rest is easy; standard and common hospital equipment that would probably be in any storeroom. Soon, he's got a full, heavy backpack, and he's rushing back through the hospital, counting the bodies of eleven Keepers on the way.

What the fuck were they doing here? He wonders as he books it back to the apartment. He looks at his watch; he's been gone almost three hours.

Three hours. His stomach turns. Liam could very well be dead by now, for all he knows. But if he is... well, Brett owes him a proper burial.

It's another half hour before he's back at the apartment. He steels himself the whole last ten minutes of his trip, ready to find Liam dead when he gets inside.

Finally, upon reaching the door, he swallows and swings it open. 

Almost immediately, Liam shifts faintly, opens his eyes for a brief moment. "Just you," he breathes. "Good. Don't feel like fighting - anyone else today." 

"I'm so glad you're alive," Brett murmurs as he approaches the bed. "I'm - it's good you're awake. I didn't think you would be." He settles down on the bed, tucks the blankets more securely around Liam. "How're you feeling?"

"Not gonna lie," Liam says, opening his eyes groggily. "I feel pretty terrible." 

Brett nods. "Yeah, I figured you would be. You're burning up." He swings the bag off his shoulders. "How's your side?"

"Throbbing," Liam says sleepily. "But it's not as bad as it could be I guess." 

Brett lifts the blankets, trying to ignore the way Liam shivers when he does, and then the edge of the gauze pad. He winces when he sees how inflamed it looks. He touches Liam's face, his forehead, making a face when he feels how hot Liam is.

_Fuck. He's really sick._ The fear hasn't settled into him properly yet; Liam was alive when he got back, which is frankly more than he was expecting.

"Right," he says. "Time to get some drugs into you." He dumps out a box of the Vancomycin tablets. "I picked up two, yeah? You're gonna need to take both. This one's easy; it's just a pill." 

"You came back alive." Liam adjusts his head sleepily. "I was worried you wouldn't." 

He looks down at Liam and smiles a bit. "Someone cleared the hospital of zombies before me," he says. "I had to take a few out, but it was an easy trip." He pops the Vancomycin pill out of its foil packaging. "Here," he murmurs, putting it in Liam's mouth.

Liam gags as he tries to swallow it down with water; Brett thinks he's going to puke until he takes a look at the pills and realises how big they are, and that most people would probably have issues with the size. Liam gets it down, though, lies back with his eyes watering.

As he does, Brett reaches into his bag and pulls out the powdered Meropenem, the IV bag, and all the other stuff he's gonna need to get it into Liam. Liam tilts his head.  
"What's that?"

Brett looks at Liam; his face is pale, save for two bright red patches on his cheeks. "It's called Meropenem," he says. "It's a really strong antibiotic. So's the Vancomycin."

"You're giving me both at once, which I guess means you're pretty worried I'm going to die," Liam says tiredly.

Brett shrugs, aiming for a casual demeanour. "You've got a lot of cuts and you've lost a lot of blood," he says. "Just being cautious is all."

Liam nods. "Can these drugs make me puke?" he asks.

Brett looks up, slightly alarmed. "Uh - one of the side effects is nausea and vomiting," he says. "Why?"

"I feel kinda sick." 

Brett nods. "If you're gonna throw up, try to let me know first," he says. "I'll try and get you over a bucket before it happens."

"Okay." Liam tilts his head. "What's that?"

"An IV. That's the only way to get the Meropenem into you." He sees Liam eyeing the needle apprehensively. "I know you hate needles," he says, his voice coming out as a plea. "But this really is the only way." 

Liam offers up his arm silently, and Brett smiles at him shakily. "Thanks. Uh - listen, I've only ever done an IV twice. So it might take me a few tries to get it right."

"Okay," Liam mumbles. He seems like he's slipping towards unconsciousness, although that's another of the many side effects of the Vancomycin pills - drowsiness. Which Brett supposes is a good thing if it means Liam gets to sleep through his entire recovery process. 

When Brett ties a tourniquet around Liam's arm, though, he realises he's not going to get lucky enough that Liam will end up unconscious, because the movement rouses him. He turns his head towards Brett again.

"How do you know all this stuff?" he mumbles. "About the salt water, and the neuro-whatevers, and the drugs. Weren't you in college?"

"I was," Brett says. "I worked as a dispensary technician." 

Frown lines appear on Liam's face. "What's a dispensary technician?"

"I found and dealt out people's drugs," Brett says. "So I know what's used for what. As for the IV, and all the other medical stuff - in my group, we had a doctor. He was teaching me. Everything went to hell before he got to teach me heaps of stuff, but I know the real basics." 

Liam smiles feebly. "That's lucky for me."

"Probably would've been luckier for you to have never met me," Brett says. "You've only been hurt recently because I've been around."

"I might've been dead," Liam mumbles.

Brett's flicking Liam's vein, trying to get it to come to the surface. "Nah, you can handle yourself okay," he says.

"I don't mean like that," Liam murmurs. "A couple of times I thought about killing myself."

Brett's blood goes cold; he stops what he's doing. "You what?"

"Sometimes I thought about killing myself," Liam says again, clearly, this time. "In winter. The sun would come up at like ten in the morning, and then it'd go down by three, and I'd spend the entire day just thinkin' about how I was gonna do it. About whether it was worth sticking around much longer. Something always stopped me." 

Brett swallows. "What stopped you?"

Liam's hand finds Brett's thigh, holds onto it. His veins are finally coming up, and Brett makes sure to sterilise the needle again. "I don't wanna die," Liam mumbles, his voice breaking. "Didn't then, still don't want to now."

"Good," Brett says shakily, trying to keep his breathing even and calm. "Because you're not gonna." He takes a deep breath, says, "you ready?" 

"Mhm." 

"Okay. It'll sting a bit." He takes another deep breath, psyching himself up for it. "You need to stay still, okay?"

"I'll stay still," Liam murmurs agreeably.

"Okay. Thanks." He takes Liam's arm, breathes in, and slides the needle in.

He's relieved when he realises it's worked, breathes a sigh of relief, and tapes it in place, untying the tourniquet. "Alright. You're set for the IV." He reaches for the Meropenem and the solution. "Now we-"

"Did you ever think about it?" Liam asks.

"About what?" Brett responds uncomfortably.

"About killing yourself," Liam says. He seems to be getting less and less lucid as time goes on. "Did you ever think about it?"

"No," Brett says. "But that's different. I had people around me. You didn't." He swallows hard. "You... don't still think about it, do you?" he asks. 

"Not since I met you," Liam says, looking up at him. And his eyes are clear, steady, and that's how Brett knows he really means it. 

He leans down, gets close, and strokes Liam's hair. "You're okay, Liam," he murmurs gently. "You're gonna be okay." 

~*~

Liam's fever holds steady over the next few hours, but it doesn't go down, and that's kind of worrying.

He's sleeping, at least - it only took two minutes for the Meropenem to knock him out, which Brett thinks is probably a good thing. Liam needs to rest, and he's not going to get it if he's up and moving or even just wriggling around.

He checks the bandages every hour or so. The wound looks bad, but not terrible, so he tries not to worry too much. 

It's five hours later when Liam wakes up, seemingly caught in a haze of pain and drug-induced confusion, and mumbles, "I really need to pee."

Brett tries to smile, tries to find that funny, but it's hard. Liam's not even remotely close to his usual self, and it's disconcerting. He's never seen Liam this sick before, and they've lived together almost three months now.

"Okay," he says. "Can you stand?" 

"Mmhm. Yeah." 

He helps Liam out of bed and outside, supports him and looks away politely while Liam does his thing. It's not anything Liam hasn't done for him before.

"Is this weird for you?" Liam asks groggily. "'Cause I'm gay?"

"No," Brett says. And then, because Liam's being so strangely honest with him, "I feel weird about it because I've never seen you this sick." 

Liam pats his arm consolingly. "I'll be fine," he mumbles. "Long as I don't freeze to death."

"Alright. Let's go inside, then." He helps Liam in, noticing him shaking his head. "What's up?"

"Just trying to get my shit together," Liam mumbles.

"Yeah. The drugs knock you around, huh? It's 'cause you're kind of small."

"Why do people always tell me that like I don't know?" Liam asks him sleepily. "I know I'm little. People always act like oh, someone tell Liam he's fuckin' short. He hasn't worked it out yet. Poor kid's walking around thinking he's built like a linebacker. I know I'm short. I can see myself in a mirror." 

Brett laughs helplessly. He knows he shouldn't, because Liam's rambling is probably because of how many drugs are in him right now, but it is funny. 

"You aren't that short," Brett chuckles. "You're just... a little smaller than average."

"Don't soften the blow," Liam says indignantly. "Telling me it's okay makes it feel like a problem."

"Only if you think it is, Li."

Liam squints at him. "What?"

Brett shakes his head. "Never mind," he says. "Go back to sleep."

But Liam's awake now, and seems pretty intent on staying that way. It takes about an hour, but the Meropenem seems to leave his system enough for him to regain some clarity. Brett thinks that the worst part of that is watching Liam actively trying to fight the drug off - he looks uncomfortable, keeps shaking his head like he's trying to clear it, his hands knotted into the towels beneath him. He knows Liam knows he's sick, enough to be worried, but the drugs are making it hard for him to think clearly. 

After giving Liam his next Vancomycin pill, Brett realises how heavy his eyelids feel. _Maybe I'll just take a nap_ , he thinks sleepily to himself. _Just an hour or so. Until Liam wakes up again..._

He closes his eyes. When he wakes up, it's because he's heard a small gasp of pain - one his sleep-addled mind registers as belonging to Liam.

He looks up sleepily, finds Liam sitting on the edge of the bed. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" he croaks.

Liam shivers. "I was gonna sit by the fire. I'm cold." 

Brett staggers over and pulls a blanket up around Liam's body. "There," he mumbles. "You get cold, let me know, and I'll fix it. Okay? You gotta stay still." 

Liam looks down on him. "But it-"

"It's infected," Brett says firmly.

"It doesn't even - I don't know. It's hard to explain, but it just feels like a muscle wound, you know? Like when I hurt my shoulder." 

Brett kneels down in front of Liam, his hands on Liam's knees. "Yeah, and it took you almost a fortnight to recover enough movement in your shoulder to go outside," he says softly. "Liam, you're hurt, okay? Just rest for a while. We're safe here. I covered our tracks, and anyway, Trent's tied up." 

Liam's hand drifts up to his side, barely for a second, but still noticeably. "Yeah," he whispers. "Okay." 

"Okay."

Brett stays where he is, though, watching Liam's face for any signs of pain. His eyebrows are slightly furrowed, which Brett knows is a sure sign of it, but there's not much he can do - he's already given Liam Tylenol for the pain a few hours ago. 

He reaches up and touches Liam's jaw, where the scuff marks from being pressed into the concrete are. "You saved my life," he murmurs. "Again. I owe you so much by now." 

"I didn't do it so you'd owe me," Liam murmurs softly.

Brett smiles. "Yeah. But still, this is, what... the one hundredth time you've put your life on the line for me? I'd like to repay you somehow."

"You patched me up," Liam says. "That's pretty good." 

"You got hurt because of me," Brett points out. 

"I got hurt because of that guy," Liam argues back. "Not because of you." He rubs the back of his neck. "Um," he says quietly. "If you wanna repay me, though, I can uh - I can think of something."

"Yeah?" Brett asks interestedly. He doesn't think Liam's ever asked for anything. "What's that?" 

"You know how... a while ago... you said I could come with you?" Liam asks hesitantly. "When you leave the city?"

"Yeah," Brett says cautiously. He doesn't want to stay here, but he will if Liam asks.

"Well..." Liam seems to be fighting to get the words out. "Could I... could I take you up on that?" 

Brett's shell-shocked. "You wanna come with me?"

Liam nods silently.

"Shit," Brett breathes. "Of course you can come with me, Li." He breaks out into a grin as he stares up into Liam's face. "That's great. I can't believe - okay, well, we better get you back on your feet pretty soon then, huh?"

Liam finally smiles back at him. "Mmhm."

Brett's suddenly caught up looking at Liam's messy bed-hair and bright blue eyes and the gentle slope of his collarbones, and before he knows it, before he really thinks about it, he's leaning up and kissing Liam softly, hands still on Liam's knees.

Liam's warm beneath his lips, surprised and still. He's not moving, and for one horrible moment, Brett thinks, _I fucked up._

Then Liam's hands are cradling Brett's neck and he's kissing back, slowly but almost desperately. His cheeks are soft, smooth - his stubble hasn't started growing back, even though it's been almost two days since Brett helped him shave. 

As much as he'd like to do this all day, Brett's suddenly and painfully aware that Liam's breathing like he's in pain, and he slides away slowly. Liam blinks down at him.  
"How long have you wanted to do that?" he asks timidly.

"Almost since the start." Brett lets his hand stroke Liam's shoulder and arm. "I didn't think... you wanted me to." 

Liam nods. His eyes are flickering between Brett's lips and his eyes.

"You?" Brett asks softly.

"Oh." Liam blinks a little. "Um... pretty much since I worked out you weren't going to kill me."

"Last week?" Brett jokes.

Liam laughs, winces, and gasps, "Don't make me laugh, it hurts," as Brett steadies him, smiling.

"Alright. Get back into bed. Go on." Brett helps Liam get settled again, on his back with his arm out, accommodating the IV. "Hey. You're gonna be fine, yeah?"

Liam nods. "Mm. I know."

~*~

Except he's not, really.

Brett notices a few hours later that Liam's taken a turn for the worse - his fever spikes, and he starts losing the thread of the conversation. When Brett checks the bandages, the wound is weeping, smells bad, looks inflamed and sore.

"Come on, Liam," Brett murmurs, trying to clean the area as he watches Liam sleep fitfully. "Be okay."


	12. Chapter Twelve - Convalescence

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't think I'd get this chapter done so soon but here it is! Also, I'm not Jeff davis and I'm not cruel enough to keep everyone on a goddamn cliffhanger for like a week. Enjoy! <3

**Chapter Twelve - Convalescence  
Liam's P.O.V**

Liam awakens slowly, painfully, like he's being dragged from his rest.

He soon realises that's pretty much the case - his wound site is pounding viciously and the low, persistent ache of a fever has gripped his body. He turns his head, swallowing, trying to go back to sleep.

He finds it impossible; the pain is too distracting and now that he's awake, his thoughts are beginning to race off, epileptic trees of unrelated tangents he knows are caused by the sheer amount of drugs Brett has pumping into him.

Brett.

Liam turns his head again, opens his eyes. Brett's sitting near the fireplace, doing something that Liam can't see from his vantage point on the bed.

_Brett kissed me_. The memory is hazy, but Liam's pretty sure it's real, not imaginary. He swallows thickly; his throat is dry. _Yeah, I'm pretty sure Brett kissed me._

He makes to move - he kind of wants to be vertical for a bit - but pain flares up his side and he sucks in a startled, wounded breath and stays still. He does, however, succeed in getting Brett's attention; Brett looks up at him.

"Hey," he whispers, standing up and coming over. "Hey, don't move."

"Yeah, I've realised that's a bad idea," Liam breathes. "Hi." 

"Hi," Brett says again, and smiles. "You've been asleep for ages."

Liam rubs his eyes. "How long?"

"About eight hours. You took your pill about two hours ago, but you weren't really awake for it." Brett settles down next to him. "What were you trying to do?"

"I was trying to sit up." Liam's voice is scratchy and wrecked with sleep. "But I've decided it's too painful and I've changed my mind." 

Brett laughs a little at that. "You want some water?"

"Yes please," Liam says gratefully. He goes to take the bottle, but the IV in his arm - which he'd forgotten about until now - yanks a little, and he has to reach over to grab it. "God, I've got so many holes in me," he grumbles.

"Just a few more than usual," Brett comments lightly.

"Which is a few too many," Liam retorts. He tilts his head back, blinking, trying to keep his eyes open. He feels exhausted, but he also doesn't think he'd sleep if he shut his eyes.   
"What's up?" Brett asks.

"You kissed me," Liam says.

"Yeah," Brett says sheepishly. "I did. I'm sorry, you probably didn't-"

"Do it again?" Liam asks.

He's pretty happy when Brett obliges, leans down, and kisses him softly. Liam swears he can feel fire between them, sparks, catching each other like matches being struck to life. Brett's a good kisser - a great kisser, actually - soft and gentle but still quietly asserting himself as being more dominant. 

Liam's getting really into it - he raises his good arm to cradle the back of Brett's head - when Brett begins to pull away from him. He groans objectively, but all Brett does is smile against his mouth and leave anyway.

"Sorry."

"Why?" Liam grumbles moodily. 

"Gotta check your bandages. And be gentle with you."

"I'm not dying," Liam protests. "We can make out. Just, you know, don't throw me around." 

"How about I check your bandages and then we make out?"

"... Alright." 

Brett chuckles. "Thought you might like that deal," he says. "Alright, hold still. Might sting a little."

"You said the saltwater would sting a little as well," Liam points out. "I almost cried." 

Brett's not really paying attention to him anymore, though; he's peeling back the bandages over Liam's wound and inspecting it. Liam shifts a little, only now registering the discomfort radiating from the site. 

"Hold still," Brett murmurs.

"Sorry."

"Does it hurt?"

Liam takes a moment. "Yeah... kind of. I mean, it's not terrible. Just kind of an ache?" 

"Yeah," Brett murmurs. "Look, it is infected, but I don't think it's as bad as it could be. I think the drugs are taking care of it. Your fever's still pretty high, but not as bad as it was yesterday." He sits back, presses the gauze pad back down over Liam's flank. "I think it'll be fine."

Liam catches Brett's hand, noticing the deep purple bruises on his wrists. "What happened?" he breathes.

"The ropes," Brett says. "Do you remember? Trent tied me up." 

He doesn't remember very well, but he nods anyway, figuring that's what happened. "You should put something cold on them," he says. It kind of hurts to talk, but still, he has to make sure Brett's taking care of himself. "They look sore."

Brett looks down at him fondly, kind of tenderly. "Don't worry. I've been icing them."

Liam nods a little. His head's kind of swimming, now that he's awake enough to notice. Still, he wants Brett to know he's alright, so he tips his head back into the pillow and says, "So... when can I move around again?"

Brett shakes his head. "Honestly? I've got no clue. I think you got pretty lucky - it looks like it was a small knife and it just cut through a few layers of subcutaneous fat and muscle, instead of puncturing any organs." 

Brett smiles at him suddenly. "What?"

Liam realises he's mouthed the last part of Brett's sentence as he tries to keep up with all the medical jargon. "I have literally no idea what you're trying to tell me," he says. "But okay." 

"I was basically just saying nothing hugely important got injured," Brett says. "You got lucky. Still, I don't know when you're gonna be up and moving again. You can't go far with the IV anyway, really, because I don't have anywhere else to hang the bag."

Liam looks up at it; the bag is empty right now. He's not sure when the next dose will be, but he's determined to make the most of his time awake. 

"It makes me really sleepy," he says to Brett.

"Yeah. One of the side effects." Brett's settling on the bed next to him. "Probably doesn't help that you're taking Vancomycin as well. Listen, are you hungry? You should probably eat something."

Liam's stomach rolls at the idea of food. "I'm not really that hungry," he mumbles, hoping Brett doesn't push the issue. "Maybe... I dunno, maybe just some crackers or something?" 

Brett nods, watching him. "Yeah. Gonna take your temperature first, though." 

Liam nods, resisting the urge to sigh. He's pretty sick of lying down and being sick and injured and having to rely on Brett for everything. But he knows if he pushes himself too much, he's going to get worse. 

He takes the thermometer in his mouth when Brett returns with it, waiting patiently with the cold nub beneath his tongue until it beeps. Brett takes it out, looks at it, and then looks at Liam, his expression deliberately blank.

"What?" Liam asks.

"Nothing," Brett says casually. "Just not as low as I'd like it."

Liam nods. "I feel a little better, though," he says. "Not as fuzzy as I did before."

Brett nods. "Just... be ready that you might feel worse," he says softly. "We got you on the drugs pretty fast, but you still had a bad fever. So you might backslide a little."

"Okay." Liam shifts a little. "I felt pretty bad last time I was awake... does that mean I'm getting better?"

"It could. Or it means you're kind of yo-yoing between getting better and getting worse." Liam realises, somewhere in the back of his mind, that Brett's talking around the issue - that he's deliberately not making much sense. But Liam's too tired to really try and work it out.

"My throat hurts," he croaks.

Brett nods. "You've got a pretty big bruise on it," he says. "Where Trent tried to choke you. It'll heal up in its own time."

Liam nods. He doesn't want to talk, because he's just realised how truly painful actually breathing is. The stitches hurt, and every time he takes a normal breath, pain shoots into his ribs and up his chest. 

"Breathe deeper, Liam," Brett says softly. "You'll make it worse if you don't." 

"Hurts," Liam admits.

"I know." Brett looks around. "You want something for it? I think we have codeine here."

Liam nods. Anything to get the pulsing, staticky pain to stop. It's constant buzz, a whirr like the angry noises of machinery.

Brett comes back to him with water and a codeine tablet, which Liam downs gratefully. Brett sits back next to him.

"If it hurts, try to sleep," Brett says. "You've been breathing a little better when you've been unconscious. The codeine will probably make you drowsy anyway."

He's right; it's barely five minutes before Liam feels the alluring tug of sleep at the edges of his consciousness. The pain is starting to numb, too, and suddenly, he's just really, really tired and really, really needs to sleep.

"Night, Liam," Brett's voice says, penetrating the fog around him.

"Night," Liam murmurs back.

~*~

He wakes up because he's burning up.

The first thing he's aware of is how badly his skin hurts, everywhere - it feels like it should be crackling, like he's on fire, like he could die from it. There's sweat rolling off him like he's had water dumped on him.

And then he notices the shaking. He feels like he could die from it, honestly - feels it right now to his bones and his teeth are chattering together. He raises his free hand to touch at his side, winces at the pain.

"Brett," he whimpers. He's out of his mind with the sheer discomfort he's experiencing and the only thing he can think to do is wake Brett up. "Brett-" 

Brett stirs beside him. "Li?" he mumbles.

"Brett, I-"

He doesn't have to continue; Brett's sitting bolt upright, his hands on Liam's face and neck. "Oh, fuck," he mutters. "Okay, hang on, okay?"

"Hang on to what?" Liam asks weakly. "Brett? Where're you going?"

Brett's swinging out of bed and Liam can't see where he's going. He shifts, but the room spins and he closes his eyes, trying desperately not to vomit. He clutches at the blanket near his hand, fingers spasming.

Brett's back suddenly, his hands and arms wet. "Alright, come on," he says. "We've gotta get you into a bath, okay, baby? We've gotta get you cooled down." 

Liam feels Brett's hands on his arm, then the swift, sudden sting of the IV being removed. Then Brett's sliding his arms beneath him and hoisting him up, bridal-style, and Liam could cry, the friction on his skin feels so awful.

_You're really sick_. There's a tiny voice in the back of his head, whispering to him. _You're really sick and your fever's gotten worse. That's why you're in pain_. 

_Brett called me baby_ , Liam thinks hazily.

He barely registers that they're in the bathroom, that Brett's apologising and then lowering Liam into the water. It feels like ice on his skin, and he whimpers, tries to lever himself up to escape it, but he can't fight Brett off like this - and Brett holds him there, and his eyes are wet.

"Just hold on, okay, Li?" Then he's reaching down and ripping the bandage off Liam's side. "I have to get your temperature back down, okay?" 

"What's wrong with my temperature?" Liam croaks.

"It's way too high. You need to stay here, okay? At least until it's back down to a normal level." Brett's stroking his hair gently. "Fuck, I should've noticed," he murmurs. "You were off before we went to sleep, I thought it was the drugs..." 

"The drugs suck," Liam croaks. "I feel sick." 

Brett grabs the bucket near the sink. "If you need it, it's here." 

Liam dozes in the tub. He's shivering still, but he drifts off for a while, and when he wakes up, it's because Brett's got a thermometer in his mouth. 

He can tell, straight away, that the bath is working, because his head is a little clearer and he knows better than to yank away from Brett and try to get out. He does, however, lean his head listlessly against the side of the tub.

"Liam?"

He looks up dazedly. Brett's watching him worriedly, peering into his eyes. "Hey," he murmurs. "Hey, you back with me?"

"Yeah." Liam rubs his face. "How long did I sleep?"

"We've been here almost two hours." Brett looks at the thermometer, and his face crumples with relief. "But I think you're okay now. Let's get you out." 

"Wh - how high was it?" Liam asks groggily. He still feels out of it, like maybe he shouldn't be having a conversation like this.

"Doesn't matter," Brett sys quietly. "You're gonna be fine now." He reaches down and Liam hears the sound of the tub beginning to drain. "I'm gonna find you a towel."

"'Kay." 

He's dozing again by the time Brett comes back, feels Brett's hands on his neck and shoulders. Then the towel starts drying him off, and he starts to feel a little more human. 

"Come on, Liam," Brett murmurs, and pats his cheek gently. "I need you to stay awake for a little bit, okay? Only a few more minutes. You need to tell me if anything hurts."

Liam tries to take inventory of his body, but he barely knows where his feet are, he feels so confused. "Um... no." 

There's a long pause; Brett's still drying him off. "Alright. Come on." With that, he's leaning into the tub and hoisting Liam up again. Liam at least has the presence of mind this time to put an arm around Brett's shoulders and cling to him.

"'S pretty hot you can carry me like this," he says hazily.

Brett snorts. "Yeah? Maybe I'll do it some more when you're better." 

"You better," Liam says groggily. "If you're gonna call me baby you gotta carry me around." 

He feels Brett gather him closer. "I'm just glad you're okay," he murmurs, and presses a kiss into Liam's forehead.

"I don't feel okay," Liam says confusedly.

"Yeah. But you will. Eventually." He's set down, and he watches as Brett opens a new gauze pad. "Hold still."

Liam doesn't think he could move very far if he wanted to; he stays still as Brett smooths the new bandage down, then ties his arm off in a tourniquet, finds a vein, and gets the IV back into him. He's so tired he barely feels the needle sliding into him. 

"Brett," he says groggily.

"Yeah?" 

"I'm gonna throw up."

He hears Brett curse and lunge for the bucket, and he only just gets it beneath Liam's face before Liam's puking weakly. Not much comes up, because he hasn't really eaten much, but it's still painful. 

"Sorry," he sniffs. He can't work out what's wrong or why he's suddenly feeling so much worse than he was before, when he went to sleep feeling like he was slowly getting better, and he's frustrated with himself but also pretty embarrassed that Brett's having to baby him so much. 

"Hey, it's okay. You're sick. You done?"

Liam nods.

"Okay. Lie back down." As he's starting to, Brett stops him. "On your side. In case you get sick, okay?" 

Liam lies on his good side, feels Brett tucking the blankets around him. "Brett," he mumbles.

"Yeah?" 

"Thanks," he says sleepily.

There's a long silence. Liam thinks Brett hasn't heard him until Brett says - so softly Liam can barely hear him - "No problem, Li."

~*~

When he opens his eyes, it's because he can hear crackling nearby.

He blinks, slowly beginning to register his surroundings. The room's dark, which means it's probably night. There's a blanket over him; he catches sight, blurrily, of a swinging bag above his head. And there's Brett, he thinks, playing with the IV.

Liam blinks. Then, all of a sudden, his side explodes into pain and he moans, caught off guard, and there's a sudden movement as Brett's leaning over him. "Liam?" he asks. "Hey, Liam? Can you tell me what hurts?"

But he can't. All he can think about is the pain, flaring up his side and into his ribs and chest and hip like someone's replaced his blood with molten lead. He can barely breathe, the pain's so bad - white hot agony, spreading right up into his lungs like fire.

"Fuck," Brett murmurs, and there's a cool cloth wiping Liam's face and neck. "Liam, come on... what hurts, baby? What hurts?"

Liam swallows. "I'm thirsty," he croaks. He needs something, anything, to put the fire out, to drown it out.

"Okay. Okay, here." Brett lifts his head, helps him drink some water. "Liam, you have to tell me what hurts," he begs. "Is it your stab wound or something else?" 

"Stab wound?" Liam has to force the question out around a sob. "Brett..." He's not sure what he's trying to say anymore; his thoughts are drifting away from him before he can catch them. "Brett, I..."

He hears Brett moving, and then he's back, and Liam sees the flash of a needle. "No," he whimpers, trying to scoot away. "No, I don't - the stitches-"

"It's not for stitches, Liam," Brett says pleadingly. "It's morphine. It's just for the pain." 

Liam's still feeling pretty panicky, but he can't really fight Brett off as he feels the needle plunge into his thigh, then slide out again. He wriggles a little, but Brett holds him still. 

"Don't let me turn," he begs.

Brett goes still. "What?"

"Don't let me turn," Liam chokes. "Please don't let me turn."

"Liam, you - you're not gonna turn, you're not gonna die-" 

Brett stops talking when Liam lets out a low, keening cry, moving closer and wrapping Liam's head and shoulders up in a hug. "You aren't gonna die, Liam," he whispers, stroking Liam's hair. "Alright? You're gonna be okay. You're not gonna turn."

"But the bite," Liam whimpers. "The bite, it turns everyone-"

"The bite?" Brett leans back, looks at him. "You haven't been bitten, Li," he says desperately. "You don't have a bite. You've been stabbed. You're really sick." 

"I know, I feel like I'm dying," Liam whimpers. "Make sure I don't turn. I don't wanna hurt anyone." 

"You're not gonna turn." Liam opens his eyes briefly; Brett's crying, he thinks, maybe. He can't really see very well though. "Liam, you aren't gonna turn, okay? You haven't been bitten."

"It fucking hurts, though, my side, it-" Liam raises his hand to feel along his side, skims the edge of a bandage. "Why're you trying to-"

"Liam!" Brett says, his voice loud and desperate. "Liam, listen to me, okay? You have not been bitten. You don't have a bite. I was kidnapped. You came and saved me, and you got stabbed getting me free. You never got bitten. We were never around any zombies." 

"You can't even amputate it," Liam sobs. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, Brett, I didn't mean-"

Brett leans down and gathers him up close, holding Liam's head against his shoulder. "Shh," he murmurs. "It's okay. I've got you, it's okay. Try to go back to sleep." There's a long pause; Liam tries not to cry anymore, but he's fucking scared, and he doesn't even remember getting bitten, doesn't know when it happened. 

"I won't let you turn," Brett croaks. "Okay? I won't - I won't let you turn, alright? I'll make sure that doesn't happen." 

"Are you sure?" Liam whimpers.

"Yeah. I'm sure. I won't let you turn." 

There's so much more Liam wants to say, but he can't find the strength to do it right now - so he lets Brett hold him and tries to listen to his breathing for as long as he can.

~*~

When he wakes up next, he's not feeling as frantic - he feels numb, actually, like he can barely move. 

It doesn't hurt anymore, he realises sleepily. That's good. 

He hears a sniff, turns his head sideways. The world spins a little. Brett's sitting beside him, though - he's got a cloth in his hands, and as Liam watches, it disappears out of his vision and touches his side briefly.

He knows it should hurt, but his senses are dulled, and all he feels is a sort of uncomfortable pressure, like going to the dentist's and getting his teeth numbed before they start to drill. He watches Brett's face hazily.

Brett looks up at him, after a minute, and jumps when he sees Liam's awake. "Hey," he says.

"Hi," Liam murmurs back.

"Are you in pain?" Brett asks worriedly.

"No," Liam says softly. "I'm alright." 

"Good," Brett says, sighing. "I'm glad. I'm, um, I'm just trying to clean you up a little, okay? Let me know if something hurts." 

Bite? Liam wonders hazily. Was it a bite? Brett... told me it wasn't, but... what...

"Are you gonna go to Oakridge?" Liam croaks.

Brett looks at him again. "What're you on about now?" he asks, voice breaking, and Liam scrambles to find Brett's hand, because he didn't mean to upset him. He manages to find Brett's fingers somewhere in the vicinity of his hip and grabs them. 

"When I die," he croaks. "Are you gonna go to Oakridge? You should. The Keepers... seems like... they're moving." He wants to be more concise than that, feels like he has more information than that, somewhere, but he can't quite bring it to the surface. "You should go to Oakridge."

"I'm not going anywhere until you get better," Brett says stubbornly. 

"But the bite," Liam says, confused. "Nobody recovers from the bite."

Brett rubs his face. "We've been over this," he says. "Three times now."

"Oh." Liam tries to smile. "Sorry. I don't remember." 

Brett's hand tightens around his, and then he's covering his face with his other hand, his shoulders shaking. Liam realises he's crying - not just crying, but sobbing, full-tilt, with no signs of stopping. He feels a pang of guilt.

"I'm sorry," he murmurs. "I'm sorry. It's okay. I'm not... nothing hurts. You're doing a good job. Thank you."

None of that seems to help; in fact, Brett cries harder. Liam swallows; he's kind of thirsty, but he needs to make sure Brett's okay. He feels... nothing hurts, he was honest about that, and he feels so tired. 

_I think I might be dying_ , he realises hazily. _Am I dying? I have to get Brett out of here... away from here. I said I would._

"Stay low," he croaks. "Off the main roads. There's a tunnel... southeast of here. Follow all the tanks. It should... it should be clear." He swallows. "Don't let anyone see you," he rasps. "Move at dawn or dusk. Should take... three days. Maybe four. The tunnel... it's ten miles long. So... try to do it in one hike. Don't... don't get stuck in there at night, okay? Not safe." 

Brett sits up. "What're you talking about?" he whispers.

"When you get through the tunnel," Liam breathes, "circle back round to the left of it. There's a river. Oakridge... they'll have built it near a water source. Follow it. The river, that is. Be careful. You won't be... the only one with that idea." He nods weakly at the table. "Marked it all on the map," he says drowsily. He can feel consciousness fading away from him. "Meant to tell you that morning. You'll be okay. Don't do anything dumb."

Brett swallows. "Will you come with me?" he asks. "I don't - I don't know if I can do it on my own." 

"Yeah," Liam breathes weakly. "Sure. I'll come. Give me a few minutes."

"Jesus." Brett's laughing, but there's a distinct sobbing noise around it. "Go back to sleep."

"I might not wake up," Liam whispers.

Brett leans in close. "If... if you don't wake up," he says, swallowing and smoothing Liam's hair back, "and this is how you... go... this will be the best way. You aren't in pain. You're safe. And I'll stay here, okay? I'll stay here while it happens." 

Liam swallows. "Thanks for not leaving me alone, Brett," he croaks.

"Never would have dreamed of it," Brett says softly. "Now just close your eyes and go to sleep, okay? Get some rest." 

"Okay," Liam mumbles. "Goodnight."

"Night, Liam."

~*~

It's light out.

When Liam comes to, it's a gentle process - consciousness ebbs back to him slowly, in lazy waves, and the first thing he's really aware of is that even behind his closed eyelids, it's kind of bright. 

He opens his eyes sleepily - he feels like he's been unconscious for years. His body has that deep sleep ache you only get when you've rested totally for a long time. The stretch of his muscles, when he moves his arms, is delicious, feels like liquid honey.

He feels better. That's what he notices next. Not like he's going to get up and go hunting anytime soon, but also not like he's going to burn to death. 

The IV moves in his arm. He looks up - the bag still has liquid in it, which means Brett must have changed it in the last fifteen minutes or so. Liam blinks, looks around as best he can, but he can't see Brett in the apartment anywhere.

"Brett?" he asks timidly.

There's no reply, so he clears his voice and tries again. The silence is the only thing that answers him. 

He starts to worry when, after five minutes, Brett still hasn't appeared. He wriggles, but he can't do much with the Meropenem still filtering into his body.

_He wouldn't have left, would he_? Liam wonders uneasily. _He wouldn't have just left me here. Not like this._

_Unless he did? Unless he thought I was..._

Liam swallows; he can feel his heartbeat rising. Did Brett really leave? He feels a surge of panic at that; he needs the drugs but he doesn't know how to change the bag himself, doesn't know how to make up the mixture, doesn't know anything about infections and wounds and keeping things clean, and he's definitely not strong enough to look after himself at the moment.

"Brett?" he calls, louder this time, more afraid. 

No answer. He's outright panicking now. He sits up - the process hurts, and it takes a while, but he gets there, swings his legs over the edge of the bed. "Brett?" he shouts. 

What if Trent got him? What if Trent somehow got free and came back to finish him off? What if he just went outside to piss and got munched on by a zombie and he's out there fucking dying? 

He looks up, realises the bag of Meropenem has finished dumping into him, and promptly rips the IV out of his arm. He staggers upright, sways, has to lean against the bed. 

The world's swimming, but as it rights he becomes conscious that he's only wearing boxers. He finds a pair of sweats and a t-shirt, grunting in pain as he gets them both on, and makes his way unsteadily to the front door.

_Please be okay,_ he thinks frantically. _At least until I can see straight enough to come find you._

He flings open the door to the apartment and stares outside.

Brett's there, in the snow, a few dozen yards away from him. He's dragging a deer behind him. Liam's stomach rolls, settles, and his heart descends from his throat and returns to its rightful place in his chest. He's so relieved, for a moment, that his vision fills with black spots and his ears ring; Brett's alive. Alive and healthy and okay.

Just as Liam's about to - well, he doesn't really know what he's about to do - Brett looks up and sees him there. His face is openly shocked, jaw open, eyes wide.

"Liam?" he calls incredulously, picking up the pace. "Liam, what the hell are you doing out of bed? Where's your IV?"

"I thought something happened to you," Liam moans, leaning against the doorframe as Brett finally reaches him. "I thought you'd gotten bitten or Trent came back for you or something, I just - I woke up and you weren't there."

Brett's expression softens. "I'm sorry," he murmurs. "I saw the deer and I had to get it fast. I didn't think you'd be awake for hours." 

Liam nods, looking up at him, feeling inexplicably emotional and like he could probably break down into tears at any given moment. He resists the urge, though. 

"I can't believe you're even standing up," Brett murmurs. "Come on, we've gotta get you back to bed, okay? It's too cold out here for you. Your fever only broke two hours ago." 

Liam nods, lets Brett help him back inside and onto the bed. He sits down, and Brett kneels in front of him, smiling a little.

"Well, that was one hell of a way to show me you're feeling better," Brett says kindly. "When did you wake up?"

"About - about twenty minutes ago." Liam's still feeling oddly shaken. "I don't - I called out to you a few times. I started panicking." 

Brett nods. "Do you remember much?"

"I - you put me in the bath. You said my fever was too high." Liam shakes his head. "I don't remember anything after that." 

Brett frowns. "Nothing?"

"No. Why?"

"You've been in and out the last two days," Brett says. "I figured you'd remember at least some of it but I guess not." 

Liam shakes his head. He's feeling pretty disoriented, to be honest - out of it and confused and honestly, kind of scared still. But Brett smiles at him and kisses him gently, and that's when Liam remembers that yeah - they've got this thing going on and Brett wants him. Like actually wants him. Still, after he's had plenty of time to actually think about it. 

Liam kisses back timidly. It's been a long time since Garrett and there was no one before that and Brett's older than him - Liam's nervous that maybe he doesn't have enough experience, that Brett will think he's just some kid. 

"What're you thinking?" Brett murmurs. "You're holding back."

"I'm still kind of shocked you haven't changed your mind about me," Liam admits. 

Brett smiles. "Never." He smooths a hand up Liam's side. "Now... you wanna kiss me properly before I go and skin the deer?"

Liam leans down. He's still kind of shy about it - he hasn't kissed anyone in two years - but fitting his mouth against Brett's makes him feel like he's come home somehow, like he's finally found someone he belongs with who won't hurt him. 

"Hmm," Brett murmurs when he pulls away. "You're a good kisser. Why didn't you tell me that?"

"You didn't ask," Liam says, blushing a bit. 

"Well, I'll make sure I do next time." Brett stands up. "Do you need anything before I go out there?"

"Um." Liam wracks his brains. "No. No, I think I'll just sit by the fire for a little while. If you wanna start bringing the meat in I can start putting the salts on it to dry it out." 

Brett frowns at him. "You sure you're up to moving around?"

Liam smiles weakly. "My back hurts from lying down so much," he says. "And it's nice to wear a shirt again." 

"I don't care if you don't wear a shirt," Brett says, tilting his head and smiling.

Liam blushes a little. "I bet."

Brett smiles, but it starts to fall off his face as he reaches up and touches Liam's waist. "How's it feeling?" he asks softly. "Be honest."

"It's..." Liam thinks about it; it's tender, sore, throbbing, but it isn't the white-hot agony he experienced before. "It's..." He looks down at Brett. "I thought it was a bite wound," he says confusedly. "When I was really sick. I remember, I - I asked you not to let me turn." 

Brett nods.

"But I didn't have a bite," Liam says. "Why'd you promise not to let me turn if you knew it wasn't a bite?"

Brett's smoothing his hands up and down Liam's sides like he's looking for something to do. "Because nothing else was calming you down," he admits quietly. "Nothing else was helping, and you were panicking." 

Liam tries to remember. He remembers being scared, freaking out, Brett cradling him and shushing him and trying to soothe him.

"I woke up again after that, right?" Liam asks hesitantly. "We... talked about Oakridge?"

"You woke up a few more times," Brett says. "But I know which one you're talking about. You seemed pretty calm." He smiles a little. "I asked you to come to Oakridge with me, and you told me to give you a few minutes."

Liam nods, attempting a small grin. "I was just trying to make you feel better. It worked; you laughed." 

Brett nods. Then he moves closer, wraps his arms around Liam, and holds him tightly, burying his face in Liam's neck.

"I was so scared I was gonna lose you," Brett says, his voice breaking. "What was I supposed to do? I thought - I thought you were dying. You thought you were dying. I was so fucking scared I was gonna leave you for five minutes to do something and come back and find you not breathing."

Liam gives him a weak squeeze; he still hasn't got his strength back, probably won't for a while. "I'm right here," he says. "I made it. I'm okay, thanks to you." 

"You're everything, Liam," Brett says softly. "Nothing else matters."

Liam breathes out. He didn't think he'd live long enough to hear someone say that - let alone find someone who actually wanted to say it to him. He tightens his grip on Brett's shoulders and buries his face in the junction between his neck and jaw, trying not to cry, because seriously, he's done enough of that lately.

"So you'll still come with me?" Brett asks softly.

Liam nods, pulling away a little. "We've both seen what happens when you go off on your own," he jokes weakly. "I have to go." 

Brett smiles.

~*~

For the next couple of hours, they work together to skin, salt, and dry out the deer meat. Brett has to do the brunt of the hard labour, but Liam can at least salt the meat - Brett's got him set up near the fire, on a few pillows, wearing Brett's zip-up hoodie over his bare chest. Liam will probably never admit it out loud, but it's comforting to be wrapped up in something of Brett's.

"Where'd you learn this?" Brett asks him.

"One of the guys in my last group was a boy scout," Liam says. "He taught us how."

The timer goes off; Brett looks at it, then at Liam regretfully. "Wash your hands," he says. "I've gotta give you your next dose of Meropenem. You might wanna be lying down." 

Liam doesn't really want to lie down again, but he sort of does as he's told - he props himself up on some pillows and leans back against the headboard of the bed, watching Brett prep the needle and tube first. 

"I still don't like needles," he says.

"I know." Brett ties the tourniquet around his arm; as they're waiting for Liam's veins to show up better, he starts stroking the palm of Liam's hand. "For the record, though, as someone who's petrified of needles - you do really well with having to have them."

"No choice, right?" Liam asks. 

"True." Brett flicks his vein. "You ready?"

"Mhm," Liam says nervously.

Brett swabs the area and leans in close, then - after warning Liam of the sting - inserts the needle. Liam winces, but he holds still, and soon Brett's taping it into place.

"Okay," Brett says, somewhat cheerfully. "The hard part's over." Liam watches curiously as he opens the top of the IV bag and begins dumping a solution into it. 

"What's that?"

"It's the liquid that facilitates the delivery of the drug," Brett explains. "Meropenem is actually a powder. So it's mixed in with a liquid to be delivered intravenously. Kind of nerve wracking for me, considering how terrible I was at ratios in math. But you aren't dead, so I must be doing it right." He seals up the bag. "Alright. You're set." 

Liam watches as it starts filtering down the tube and into his body. "How long have I been on this stuff for?"

"Oh... maybe two, two and a half days?" Brett asks. "Your fever broke after a few doses. It's good stuff." He sits down next to Liam. "Expensive as hell, though. Same with the Vancomycin. They're some of the strongest antibiotics on the market. They're pretty much last-resort medication."

"So if it wasn't the apocalypse, I'd be dead?" Liam jokes.

"Unless you could find the money, yeah." Brett surveys him. "You feeling okay?"

Liam nods.

"Hmm. Knocked you around like hell until now," Brett murmurs. "I suppose you're a little stronger. Sleep if you need to, okay?" 

"Okay," Liam says. "Can I keep helping with the meat once it's done?"

"If you're up to it," Brett says.

Liam blinks, feeling a little weird about that. He watches as Brett gets back to work - they talk a little bit, here and there, about what they've learned from various people they've met along the road, or in their groups.

He notices the bag is done around the same time he notices that he's slumped down against the pillows, fighting to keep his eyes open. Brett smiles at him.

"Tired, huh?"

Liam nods.

"Yeah. Me too." Brett stands up, washes his hands, and comes over. "The meat's done, though," he says as he pulls the tape off Liam's arm and slides the needle out. "Which means I can take a nap too." 

Liam yawns. "Mm. Fuck, I'm so tired."

"Don't fight it," Brett advises. "You've been really sick and being unconscious isn't the same thing as sleeping. You need to rest."

Liam rolls to face Brett, reaches out hesitantly, touches his face. Brett's got a smattering of stubble across his jaw and cheeks, but Liam doesn't mind. Likes it, even.

He holds Brett's face with a little more confidence when Brett nuzzles into his touch. "Thank you," he murmurs. "For not leaving me. For not giving up on me. I would've died if you hadn't stepped in." 

Brett opens his eyes. "You might've anyway."

"But I didn't," Liam says. "And that's thanks to you." With that, he leans forward and kisses Brett deeply, and later on he can blame the drugs if he feels self-conscious. But now, he wants Brett to know how grateful he is. "Thank you," he murmurs again.

"Any time," Brett says softly.

Liam smiles. "Hopefully not anytime soon, right?"

Brett nods, holds out his arm. After a moment, Liam shuffles closer and puts his head against Brett's shoulder, closing his eyes.

"You need anything," Brett says sleepily, "you wake me up. Okay?"

"Okay," Liam murmurs.

~*~

Brett's moving around when Liam wakes up again.

He feels stronger again, sits up sleepily. He's tucked up under a few blankets and duvets, to stave off the cold probably, and Brett's near the fire, reading.

"Hey," Liam croaks. 

"Hey," Brett replies. "You slept for ages. I was about to wake you up, get you to take your pill." 

Liam groans, scoots to the edge of the bed, and takes the pill, swallowing it with a mouthful of water. "How long is this gonna take?" he asks miserably. 

"You mean the drugs?" Brett asks.

Liam nods.

"About two weeks," Brett says regretfully. "I'm sorry. I know they make you feel crappy. But if you stop them now, the infection's gonna come back."

Liam nods. "I know, I just... I'm already sick of being tired, and it's only been a day." 

"You might adjust to them," Brett says. "Over the next few days, that is. That might make it a little easier."

"I hope you're right." Liam rolls again. "Can I sit with you?"

Brett laughs a little. "Liam. I would love you to sit with me." 

Liam gets up. He's dizzy, kind of slow, but he makes his way to the fire and settles down against Brett's side, leaning on him gently. Brett puts an arm around him; Liam can see, now, that Brett's been whittling away at a piece of wood.

"What're you making?" he asks sleepily.

"I dunno yet." Brett holds it up to the light, tilting it a little. "What do you think I should make it?"

"A bear," Liam says.

"That was fast." Brett moves his arm and picks up his knife. "Why a bear?"

Liam shrugs. "It's winter." 

"Bears hibernate in winter," Brett points out.

"Not this one." He leans his head against Brett's shoulder, watching the chunk of wood, suspended against the light in a way that makes Liam feel hazy and lost. "Yeah. A bear."

Brett's hand touches his forehead gently; Liam pushes into the touch, relishing in it.

"You feeling okay?" Brett asks quietly.

"I dunno. I'm not sick. Just kind of... out of it." He blinks. "The drugs?"

"Probably. Tell me if you start feeling worse, okay?" 

"Mhm. Show me how to make the bear."

"Man, you're really focussed on that, huh?" But Brett starts whittling away at the wood, even as Liam realises, vaguely, without any sense of urgency, that he's probably pretty fucked-up on the drugs. It's not like he's had a break from either of them. 

He shifts. His side hurts, and he can almost feel his skin crackling with dried sweat and blood. He's suddenly embarrassed; he probably smells terrible, given that he hasn't really showered or bathed in two days, and he's been sweating and bleeding and excreting God knows whatever else.

He sits up slowly, moving his head from Brett's shoulder. He's suddenly realised how greasy his hair is - and then, when he remembers that he was bleeding from the head a few days ago, and that he never actually got it wet after that, he feels so grossed out he shivers.

"Where're you going?" Brett asks curiously.

"Shower," Liam says unenthusiastically. "I stink." 

Brett stands up with him. "You need some help?" he asks. "I don't wanna baby you. I just also don't want you to fall and hurt yourself."

Liam tries to smile. "You just wanna see me naked." 

Brett shrugs, smiling back hesitantly, like he's glad Liam's joking with him - even if it is a pretty poor effort at it. "Yeah. That's true." He rocks a little. "So is that okay?" he asks. "That I go with you?"

"Yeah." Liam makes his way slowly to the shower; his whole body feels like it's aching. But the feeling of dirt is worse than that; there's about three days' worth of grime and sweat and blood and tears all over him - he can feel antiseptic and dried blood in his elbows, too, both of them, where Brett's been alternating veins for the IV.

He turns the shower on before he gets in, setting it to hot even though he knows it won't do anything, and begins stripping off. His boxers are different, which he supposes means Brett changed him. He tries not to feel embarrassed about that; Brett's his... whatever, now, so it shouldn't be weird.

But it is, because he can't remember. He steps under the water with a sigh, feeling it sluice through all the crap on him. 

"Better?" Brett asks. He's sitting with his legs out against the wall, watching Liam closely.

"Yeah," he sighs, grabbing the bar of soap they have in there. "Yeah, wow. This is awesome."

"Be careful when you wash your hair," Brett says anxiously. "You had a pretty big cut from where he hit you over the head."

Liam starts feeling around in his scalp. "Where?" he asks helplessly. Then, on impulse, he opens the shower door and tips his head towards Brett. "Show me?"

Brett's hands enter his hair, which is still dry. "Uh... here," he says, and Liam knows the spot straight away, because he feels a brief, angry flare of pain. "Just be careful. I couldn't stitch it shut, and it bled for a while, so the scab is probably really delicate still." 

"Okay. Thanks." Liam's back in the shower after that, washes his hair carefully and rinses out - the shampoo suds aren't even white. "Fuck, that's so gross." He looks at Brett. "How'd you handle being around me?"

"You were sick," Brett says. "The last thing on my mind was how good you smelled." 

"I guess." He tilts his torso a little, trying to get a good view of the stitches; when he does, he notices they look a little neater, that there are old holes healed over. And the thread is a different colour to what he remembers, too. 

He looks at Brett. "Did you...?"

"I had to take the first lot out," Brett says. "Your infection was bad. Took the stitches out, scraped out all the pus and dead skin, then stitched you back up. You got a little better after that."

"How'd you keep me still?" Liam asks blankly.

"With great difficulty," Brett says dryly. "I thought it was bad trying to keep you down the first time. At least you understood the first time that I was trying to help you. The second time you were convinced I was torturing you for fun." 

"Sorry," Liam says meekly. He does feel pretty bad for causing Brett trouble, even if it was because he was out of his mind with pain.

"Don't be. It was the fever talking, not you." Brett smiles at him. "You feel better?"

"I dunno about better," Liam admits. "But more human." 

Brett's expression is soft, tender - Liam doesn't think anyone's ever looked at him like that before. "Good," he says quietly. "I've got a towel here when you're ready to get out."

Liam nods, stays under the spray for another five minutes even though it's cold. When he eventually gets out, Brett's got the towel around him almost immediately.

"Thanks," Liam says, smiling. He's trying to show Brett that he really is feeling a lot better, and closer to being alive than dead. "Hey, can you keep showing me how to make that bear?"

"Yeah, sure," Brett agrees. "How about getting dressed first? And getting a new bandage on you." 

"Okay," Liam agrees.

Brett leaves him alone for a bit to pull on boxers, socks, and sweats. When Liam looks up, Brett's at the medkit, ruffling around in it.

Liam watches him. Brett's got really broad shoulders, a narrow waist, defined upper arms and chest muscles. Liam remembers Brett carrying him to the tub and looks down at himself; he's dropped weight.

"What're you thinking about?" Brett asks.

"Nothin'," Liam lies, probably unconvincingly. 

Brett looks at him, but seems to decide to let it go. "Yeah. Okay." He opens up a gauze pad and pours some water onto the inside. "You ready?"

Liam nods. Brett peels the sticky parts of the pad off and smooths it onto Liam's side.

Liam hisses; he can tell, straight away, that Brett used the fucking saltwater again. At least he looks apologetic about it.

"Now that you aren't dying or anything," Brett says. "I know it kind of stings, but it does keep the wound clean." 

Liam nods; it's throbbing, now, but it isn't the worst thing he's felt - not by far. "Yeah. Okay. Makes sense I guess." He shuffles where he's sitting. "Now what?"

"Now we just... wait," Brett says. "I guess. The drugs are working, your fever's broken..."

"Don't know what to do with yourself now that I'm not in mortal peril, huh?" Liam comments dryly. 

There's a pause, and then Brett smiles. "Yeah. I do."

"Huh?" Liam asks, and then Brett's standing up and pushing him back into the mattress, climbing on top of him. "Oh," Liam breathes. "Oh, yeah. Okay. I get it."

"Yeah? Good." Then Brett's leaning down, kissing him softly, his hands holding Liam's face softly. His stubble scratches Liam's upper lip.

Liam tries to remember how, exactly, to do this. It's been so long he's out of practice; he eventually remembers to tilt his head up, opens his mouth a little, using his tongue to trace timidly at Brett's soft lips.

Brett obliges what he's doing, pulls Liam's lower lip into his mouth and suckling gently. Liam thinks he could pass out, it feels so fucking good. He lifts his hands up, using one to grip Brett's waist and the other to hold the back of his neck. 

Brett pulls away from him, gently, but still unexpectedly. Liam chases him up until his wound twinges annoyingly.

"You wanna go on top?" Brett whispers.

"Yeah," Liam murmurs back, and Brett rolls off him. Liam swings his legs over Brett's waist and leans down. This doesn't hurt his injury, at least, because he's kind of sitting down.  
"Hmm," he sighs.

Brett kisses his jaw, his chin, down along the line of his throat. "You've got great bone structure," he murmurs reverently.

Liam's not sure exactly what kind of dirty talk that's meant to be - until he realises it's a heartfelt compliment and something weird happens in his chest.

"I'm so glad you're okay," Brett murmurs. 

"Yeah." Liam's throat feels tight. "Me too." 

~*~

_"Is this the way out?"_

_"Jesus, Liam. Ask me once more, the answer might change."_

_Liam shrugs to himself, ignores Garrett's irritable snarking, and continues to follow him through the winding sewer systems. He doesn't know where they're going, really. Only that Garrett's leading the way, as usual, and Liam's lost, as usual._

_"Do you think the others are back yet?" Liam asks._

_"They should be," Garrett says. "Not like they had a hard job."_

_Right. Dispatching a herd of fifty zombies - totally not a hard job. Liam knows the only reason him and Garrett are down here is because the adults need all the manpower they can get, even if that manpower does come from two teenagers, but don't want them on the front lines dealing with munchers._

_Liam hesitates a little. "Garrett, we've been down this one before," he says._

_"What?" Garrett asks._

_"This tunnel. We've been here before." Liam points. "The bars are in exactly the same spots."_

_"So? They're probably mirror images of each other," Garrett sighs. "Come on, Liam. We're almost back. And this time, it all went according to plan."_

_"Don't say that," Liam mutters as they continue forward. "We aren't home yet."_

_"God, Liam, you're the biggest killjoy," Garrett mumbles back. "Just walk faster. I'll give you head tonight if you do."_

_Liam walks faster. Not from any particular desire for head, because with their sleeping arrangements, he knows it won't happen. But he's starting to think he can hear things, which is freaking him out, and he fucking hates these tunnels. They've been using them, as a group, to get around for a while now, but they're complicated and sprawl most of the underground area of the city they're in._

_Garrett stops, and Liam bumps into him. "Hey."_

_"Do you hear that?" Garrett whispers._

_Liam feels a surge of irritation. He's been trying to tell Garrett for most of the last hour that he thinks there are zombies nearby - maybe trapped behind grates or on other levels, but there._

_"Yeah," he says, deciding not to tell Garrett "I told you so", because that'll just piss him off. "We should get back."_

_Garrett nods, but he looks pissed. "It's stupid," he grumbles. "They could've at least given us a map or something."_

_Liam shrugs as he follows along. Garrett's striding ahead, making him kind of nervous - he's not walking slowly enough to be able to tell if something's about to happen.  
"Garrett," Liam says uneasily. _

_"Oh, what now?" Garrett demands. "Look, Liam, I get that you're a nervous wreck, but-"_

_Liam sees it in slow motion. Garrett's not looking at him, is almost jogging ahead at this point, and Liam sees it - a hidden corner, the flash of a shadow on the ground, and then, quite suddenly, a zombie._

_He opens his mouth and he's calling out Garrett's name in warning but the zombie's on him already, and Liam's sprinting forward, his knife out, sinking it into the thing's skull and rendering it permanently dead. He looks down._

_Garrett's sitting at his feet and his forearm is bleeding, a clear imprint of teeth on the inside. Liam's world goes black for a moment, his ears ringing with shock._

_"Liam?" Garrett asks weakly._

_Liam sheaths his knife and hauls Garrett upright. "Come on, we have to get you back, come on, move fast, keep up with me, okay, please keep up with me-"_

_"Liam, is it bad?"_

_"I don't - just please keep up, okay, Garrett, please don't leave me. Please don't leave me." Liam sees the marker they were missing before and lunges for the right hallway, trying to keep an eye out for zombies and keep Garrett upright and move fast. "You'll be fine."_

_Garrett's not speaking, and Liam wonders, as he sees the door ahead, if Garrett's in shock. He doesn't have time to think about it; he flings open the door and the rest of the group is there, waiting. They whip around._

_"He's been bitten," Liam pants._

_The room explodes into activity; Owen gets to his feet and takes Garrett from Liam, heaves him up onto a table. Garrett's barely moving - he's crying, though, tears running down the sides of his face._

_"Just once?" Owen asks._

_"Just once," Liam moans. "Just his arm. Please help him."_

_Garrett's struggling against Owen's hands on his shoulders, beginning to finally feel the pain of the bite, apparently._

_"Fuck," Owen pants. "Fuck, okay, kid, just calm down, alright? We're gonna help you."_

_But Garrett can't, or won't, because he's still wriggling monstrously and Owen's starting to really struggle._

_"Hold still!" Owen yells. "Liam, hold him still!"_

_And Liam does, lunges forward and puts all his weight onto Garrett's knees and legs, trying to stop him from squirming._

_Jan is tying her belt off around Garrett's bicep and then pinning his shoulders, and Owen's pulled out his machete - Liam realises, a split second before it arcs into the air, what's going on._

_"NO!" Garrett bellows._

_The machete swings down, and Garrett's screaming so loud Liam thinks his lungs are going to burst, like he's fucking dying, and Liam's struggling against his legs, which are writhing beneath him. Blood sprays everywhere._

_"Okay, okay, again," Owen says, and the machete swings through the air again and Garrett's howling like a wounded dog, and-_

_There's a thudding noise, and Liam looks up, feeling faint as he sees the stump of Garrett's arm - and the rest of it, lying on the floor next to the table. Garrett's not even conscious anymore, not moving, and there's yelling as people try to pack the wound with bandages._

_"Liam!" Owen's grabbing his arm. "Liam, did you get bitten?"_

_"I - I - no."_

_"How long?" he asks urgently. "How long has it been?"_

_Liam swallows. "Two minutes," he whispers. "It's been two minutes."_

_Then the ground is rushing up to meet him, and he's out._

~*~

Liam wakes up crying.

For a moment, he barely knows who he is or where he is or who he's with. He keens, embarrassingly loud, as he sits up.

"Liam, hey." 

He turns around. Brett's sitting up beside him, looking worried. "Hey," he whispers. "Hey, it's okay. It's okay." He reaches out, giving Liam time to stop him, and puts his hands on Liam's shoulders. "It was just a dream."

"It wasn't just a dream," Liam says, his voice breaking. "It was a memory." He turns his face away because he can feel it crumpling; he hasn't dreamed about Garrett in so long, and that memory, that's the worst one, even apart from having to shoot him, because it's tinged with the hope that maybe the amputation will work-

"Come here," Brett murmurs.

Liam doesn't go any closer, but Brett shuffles over to him and holds him loosely around the shoulders - Liam could get away if he really wanted to. He doesn't. 

"Do you wanna talk about it?" Brett asks softly.

"Did I ever tell you what actually happened to Garrett?" Liam croaks. "He um, we were in the sewers together, trying to get back to our group, and we got kinda lost, and he was - he was just being a teenager, you know, getting angry and making bad decisions and he got bit." Liam shudders with the memory, finds Brett's forearm, massages the spot where Garrett got bit just to make sure there's nothing there.

"I couldn't - I couldn't do anything, I just - I pretty much carried him out of there and I got him back to our group and this guy, Owen, he was fucking huge, you know, ex-linebacker or whatever, and he amputated Garrett's arm and I held him down, and God, he just, he screamed like we were trying to kill him." Liam tries to breathe around the rising sob. "I just, it was two minutes, Brett, it was two fucking minutes. From when he got bit to when he got it amputated and it didn't work." 

"Liam," Brett breathes. "Liam, I..."

Liam shakes his head. "It wasn't fair," he chokes. "It just wasn't fair." 

"I know it wasn't." Brett's holding him tighter now, like he's realised Liam wants him to. "I know."

"I couldn't help him," Liam says. "All I could do was - was not let him turn." 

Brett presses a kiss to the side of his head, his temple, his thumb rubbing Liam's shoulder where his hand rests. He's not saying anything anymore, but Liam almost prefers the silence. He puts his head on Brett's shoulder and sits there, slumped, for the next ten minutes.

"The memories are worse than the nightmares," he whispers to Brett.

"Yeah." Brett holds him closer. "I know." 

Liam traces Brett's inner forearm slowly with his fingertips, a little calmer every time he realises there's no bite wounds, no marks, no nothing. 

He closes his eyes. Breathes in, then out. Reminds himself that he's still here. Reminds himself that Brett's still here, and Brett's not Garrett, never will be. But he's the reason Liam's alive to remember him, and that means something else entirely to Liam. 

"That whole group is gone now," he says. "Within two days. I don't know how it happened so fast... that was when I came here." 

Brett nods against him. 

"Thank you for saving my life," Liam whispers into the darkness. "Otherwise nobody would be left to remember them." 

Brett still doesn't say anything. But Liam feels a wet patch on his shoulder and thinks maybe Brett's crying right along with him, and that makes him feel a little better.   
He's not in it alone anymore.


	13. Chapter Thirteen - Mirror Images

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Is it just me or does AO3 keep updating its system? Oh well. Hope you guys enjoy this one :D

**Chapter Thirteen - Mirror Images**

Brett's gonna write a sequel to his book.

Continuing on his story of befriending a seventeen year old apocalypse hermit, he's going to title this one, "How To Get Your Seventeen-Year-Old Apocalypse Hermit to Eat and Drink After Being Stabbed". So far, he's got a very, very short list of methods that work.

Method one: guilt him into it. Begging usually works - said hermit feels bad for supposedly being a burden and will eat if made to feel guilty enough.

Method two: straight-up beg. Hermit eventually gets sick of the word "please" and caves for long enough to eat a few crackers.

Method three: wait until hermit is so physically hungry not even the nausea can stop him from eating.

That's the whole list so far. 

It's not even that Liam's a particularly stubborn patient; he takes medication without being coaxed, cajoled, or otherwise begged to do it, stays still and doesn't put himself at risk by moving too much, allows Brett to change his bandages and check his stitches and take his temperature every two hours without a word of complaint.

But eating and drinking? That's a completely different story. Liam wants nothing to do with food or water. The most he's eaten in the last day has been some crackers, a little bit of deer meat, and a bottle of water.

Brett's stressing the fuck out. He's sure the lack of nutrition is probably damaging Liam's recovery, but there's no way to force him to eat. 

At least Brett's starting to see a pattern - the Meropenem and Vancomycin don't seem to be causing the nausea and vomiting. The codeine is a different story. Brett's tried tapering the doses further apart, but Liam still can't keep anything down once he's had them. He's also in enough pain from his wound that Brett's trying to weigh up which is worth sacrificing - Liam's comfort, or his appetite. Because while Liam can eat off the codeine pills, he also doesn't breathe very well when he's off them, like his lungs expanding strains his chest muscles.

Brett hears movement from the bed, turns around. He's pretty happy to see Liam reaching for the water bottle, taking a few sips, and then tucking himself back under the covers with closed eyes.

Since the initial burst of energy, Liam's declined again, although Brett thinks that could be because Liam's body is struggling to cope with the infection, the amount of drugs in his system, and the actual pain and tissue damage of the stab wound itself. It's a lot for any person to take on, but Liam's barely more than a kid and definitely not an adult.

He knows at this point that Liam's not in danger of dying anymore. Still, it's looking like the next few weeks are going to be a long, uphill recovery process. Brett thought Liam would be cranky and snappish, but he's barely spoken the last few days. 

He watches sadly as Liam frowns and kicks a few blankets off him. He's lying on his bad side - he told Brett, a while ago, that the pressure of the mattress helps with the pain. Brett wonders if there's another way to put pressure on that won't jostle the stitches and gauze pad, but can't think of any.

Liam readjusts again, goes still with a low sigh of discomfort. Brett feels like he's engaging in some pretty voyeuristic behaviour, really, so he looks away. 

He works on doing inventory for half an hour before getting nervous about the lack of movement and turns around to look at Liam, who seems to have successfully kicked most of the blankets off him. Brett hesitates, but ultimately, he gets up quietly and heads to the bed. 

Liam’s curled up with his eyes shut, but his breathing isn’t deep enough for him to be sleeping, even though he looks exhausted.

Brett sits on the edge of the bed and runs a hand through Liam’s hair softly. On the second pass, Liam blinks his eyes open drowsily and looks up at him.

“Hi,” he mumbles. “You need some help?”

Brett smiles a little; Liam’s not up to helping him just yet. “Nah. Just came to check on you. See how you’re doing.” He rubs Liam’s good side, because Liam seems to enjoy having his muscles kneaded there. 

“I’m alright,” Liam yawns. “Just sleepy. What else is new?”

Brett nods slowly. “Can I check your bandages?”

Liam rolls obediently onto his good side, exposing the side that has the wound on it to Brett, and moving his arm so that Brett can pull his shirt up. He hesitates; Liam’s being agreeable, not snarking at him or looking snappy, and that only ever happens when he’s sick.

“You tell me if it hurts,” Brett says, “and I’ll stop.”

“Mhm,” Liam says quietly.

Brett hesitates again, but ultimately he pulls Liam’s shirt up and peels back the medical tape holding his bandage in place. He peers at the stitches; they’re holding steady, and the wound is clean and free of infection.

The bandage looks clean, but Brett decides to change it anyway, just in case. He peels off the old one all the way and puts some cold water on a new one - keeping the wound damp is meant to help it heal, so say the medicine books.

He smooths the new bandage down over Liam’s ribs and watches, surprised, as Liam relaxes, giving a soft sigh, and shuts his eyes. 

He’s not sick, Brett realises. He’s in pain. The cold water is soothing.

He wonders why Liam didn’t tell him, then realises that pain might be such a constant state for Liam right now that he doesn’t notice it getting worse. He might not have made the connection between the cold water and the pain relief. _He also probably didn’t want to bother me_ , Brett thinks guiltily. _Not after I snapped at him two days ago._

Doing most of the work is rough. Brett’s not good at a lot of it - he can’t clean weapons to save his life, and he’s terribly inefficient at time-management, and between that and the stress of making sure Liam’s getting his doses of antibiotics and painkillers, as well as staying on top of the nausea and vomiting, as well as trying to get Liam to eat and drink - well, it’s not easy, and two days ago he ended up snapping at Liam to “just do something”.

Liam never rebuked him for it, either, which makes it worse, because that’s not like Liam at all - to take things lying down. In fact, he’d just kind of… slunk off into a corner, near the fire, and started doing inventory, staying there until Brett apologised - trying to stay out of the way, Brett guesses.

Still, if this means Brett can take Liam off the codeine tablets - which make him groggy and nauseous and could end up being addictive - and still manage to ease his pain, he’ll do it. He’s sure Liam’s lethargy is due to a number of factors - one of them being the sheer amount of medication he’s on. One of the last things either of them needs is for Liam to get addicted to pain medication.

He pulls Liam’s shirt back down. “Wait here,” he murmurs. “I’ll be back in a second.”

“Not going anywhere,” Liam says softly.

Brett heads outside with a plastic bag and starts snapping icicles off the railings of the steps. When he’s done, he goes back in, sits near Liam, and lifts his shirt again.

“What’re you doing?” Liam asks, even though he doesn’t really seem to care.

“Nothing.” Brett puts the bag of ice against Liam’s wound.

The initial flinch from the cold is nothing compared to the way Liam sinks into the mattress bonelessly, his eyes slipping shut. Brett feels a pang of guilt; Liam’s been in pain this whole time and hasn’t said anything.

He holds the bag there, using his thumb to stroke Liam’s skin gently. “You’ve gotta tell me when you’re hurting, Li,” he murmurs. “You can’t recover if you’re in pain.”

“I don’t wanna take the codeine anymore,” Liam says tiredly.

“Why not?”

Liam shifts against the mattress. “Because it makes me sick and tired and it feels worse than the pain.”

“Okay.” Brett keeps stroking Liam with his thumb. “We’ll try Tylenol, then. If that doesn’t work, we can always cut the codeine pills in half - should take the edge off and not make you sick or anything. That sound good?”

“Yeah, I… okay.” Liam doesn’t look that enthusiastic about the idea, though. “Can we keep using ice? That helps.”

“Yeah. Of course. Until it melts, that is.”

He sits there for a while, holding the ice pack against Liam's side. At some point, Liam shifts a little, turns to look over his shoulder, and says, "You don't have to stay. I can do it."

Brett shakes his head. "I don't mind," he murmurs. "Unless you want to be left alone."

Liam smiles tiredly. "Not really." 

Brett sits there until the ice melts, chattering with Liam softly about their lives before. He's learned that Liam was good at English and history, terrible at math and biology, and had just made first line on the lacrosse team. The list of things he knows about Liam is slowly starting to equalise with the list of things he doesn't know... and that feels pretty nice.

After a while, though, Brett starts to get hungry, and the ice has melted into a bag of lukewarm water. Liam tells him to get something to eat, and so Brett moves away reluctantly, putting some canned beans over the fire.

He can't help but watch as Liam starts to sit up, then stands, unzips his hoodie, and peels the bandage gingerly off his chest, revealing the stab wound. It still looks worse than it should, and Brett knows it's because Liam's still fighting the infection, even though the fever has gone. 

He listens to the shower turn on and run for five minutes, straining his hearing for any signs that Liam might have collapsed. His worries are unfounded; Liam exits a few minutes later, hair wet, in new clothes.

"Feel better?" Brett asks.

"A little." Liam sits on the bed. "Do I use a new bandage?"

"Always use a new bandage," Brett says. "Even if the last one seems clean." 

Liam nods, gets out a new one, and wets it a little before sticking it down over his side. Brett notices his hands shaking, that his chest is moving strangely with each breath.  
His stomach drops. The last codeine pill has worn off, which means Liam's going to start to have trouble with the pain again soon unless he takes another. 

Half a pill, Brett tells himself. Half a pill right before bed. Hopefully he sleeps through it.

~*~

Brett’s not sure what woke him.

He shifts sleepily, taking a while to get accustomed to being awake. He reaches out, meaning to palm Liam’s back, or touch his hip or thigh, but the space Liam normally occupies near the wall is empty.

He lies still, confused, for another moment. He wants to call out, but if Liam’s not here, that might not be-

The quiet sound of retching catches his attention, and he’s sitting up straight away, turning to the fire. Liam’s sitting on one of the pillows, bucket cradled between his crossed legs, vomiting.

“Oh, shit,” Brett breathes, scrambling out of bed. “Liam?”

Liam coughs miserably. “Hi. Sorry.”

Brett sits down next to him. “How long have you been awake?” he asks worriedly.

“Twenty minutes.” Liam presses a hand against his forehead. “Sorry for waking you up, I was trying to be quiet.”

“I know you were,” Brett murmurs, resisting the urge to scold him. Scolding Liam rarely works; if anything, it just makes him more likely to hide what’s going on. 

He puts a hand on Liam’s back, trying to be as gentle as possible. Liam’s shaking a little; Brett bites his lip.

“Is it your side?” he asks quietly.

Liam shakes his head, but he doesn’t verbally answer. Brett’s about to prompt him when Liam starts heaving painfully again. There’s nothing coming up except bile, though, which Brett can only hope means it’s almost over.

Liam sits up after a moment, properly, wiping his mouth shakily. “It’s the codeine,” he croaks miserably. “Again.”

"You only took half a pill before bed," Brett says helplessly. 

Liam looks up at him miserably, nods once, and puts his head back over the bucket and tries to breathe deeply, even though Brett can hear his inhalations stopping harshly with every stretch of his chest muscles.

His stomach turns. Okay. Liam can't handle the codeine. That much is obvious. Either the doses are too much, still, or the medication itself just disagrees with him. Brett's not willing to try tapering them again; Liam can't keep getting sick like this.

_I've gotta get him off the codeine_ , Brett realises. _If he can't even handle half a dose and it's not taking the edge off the pain, it's useless._

"Okay," he says quietly. "No more codeine. I promise."

Liam nods a little. He's got one hand on his forehead, elbow on his knee, propping himself up while the other arm loosely grips the bucket. He's breathing heavily, like he might be sick again any second now.

Brett hesitates before touching the back of Liam's neck; his skin is wracked with light tremors. Brett tucks his hoodie closer around his neck. 

"Let me take a look at you?" he asks quietly. 

Liam shakes his head, and Brett's about to argue with him until he sees Liam's back jolt again and realises he's going through another round of heaving - dry, this time. His chest clenches desperately as he rubs Liam's back; there's nothing he can do to help this. At some point, he's got to stop medicating every ailment that comes up. 

Liam chokes his way through this round of retching slowly, weakly, like he's powerless to stop it and his muscles are forcing him to perform the action - maybe they are. But there's nothing there to bring up. 

This is almost worse than before. Liam's not dying, but he sure as fuck knows he's suffering, and at least he didn't before. 

"Sorry," Liam croaks. "I'm trying to stop." 

"Don't - don't try to stop." Brett's feeling pretty shaken. "If you need to puke, do it, okay?" 

Liam nods, but he's beginning to straighten out his torso a little bit. Brett sits a little closer to him, puts an arm around Liam's waist. He's still trembling faintly, but it feels like it might be easing up.

"Can I take a look at you now?" he asks gently.

Liam nods. Brett tilts Liam's face up, checks for fever - he's sweating and shaking, but his skin is cool to the touch, which is good. Next, he moves the bucket and peers at Liam's side. The stitches are still in place, not bleeding. Liam meets his eyes - they're clear and soft around the edges. 

"How's your side?" Brett asks. "Does it hurt?"

"Yeah," Liam whispers. His voice is wrecked; Brett doesn’t think he’s even trying to whisper. He just can’t raise his voice anymore. "Yeah, it does." Liam tries to clear his throat, wincing at the action. "It'll pass." Clearing his throat hasn't helped at all; he still sounds like he's been gargling nails.

Brett puts an arm around Liam’s shoulders. “We’ll work something else out,” he thinks aloud. “There’s gotta be a better way to manage your pain than this. Tylenol, maybe, or… more ice on it. But we’ve gotta get you eating properly again. And drinking water.”

Liam leans on him. “Mom used to give me Powerade,” he croaks. “Because she said that after puking you needed the electrolytes.”

“I’d give you Powerade if I had any,” Brett murmurs, rubbing Liam’s shoulder gently. “But any that’s left is probably way out of date, so you’ll have to deal with me forcing water on you all the time.”

Liam smiles weakly. “I’d rather that than the codeine.”

Brett closes his eyes. “I’m sorry about the codeine,” he murmurs. “If I’d known it was gonna make you this sick, I wouldn’t have given it to you.”

“Then I probably would’ve gone crazy from the pain,” Liam says sleepily. “One thing at a time, right?”

Brett smiles. Liam’s trying to be positive, and that’s a good sign. “Yeah.” He looks around, finds a bottle of water on the table and reaches for it. "You think you can drink something?" 

Liam nods. He looks kind of apprehensive, but he takes the bottle and takes a sip, then swills it around in his mouth before spitting into the bucket. Only after that does Liam actually start sipping on it slowly. "You should go back to bed," he says to Brett. "I don't know how long I'll be awake." 

Brett looks at the watch on his wrist. "You're due for another pill in about an hour anyway," he says quietly. "I'll stay awake, make sure you take it. It's not fun getting sick alone, huh?"

Liam shakes his head.

They sit there for a little while. Liam drinks occasionally, and doesn't seem to need to puke anymore - even though he still looks pretty white. Brett knows he's probably still pretty nauseous. He's feeling pretty nervous about somehow getting Liam to swallow his pill; they're fucking huge tablets, and Liam struggles enough when he's not on the brink of puking. 

"You okay here?" Brett asks softly.

Liam nods, watching as Brett stands up and goes to the table. He finds a knife, takes out Liam's pill, and carefully cuts it in half.

"What're you doing?" Liam croaks.

"Should make it easier to swallow," Brett says. "You still need to take the full dose, but at least the tablet isn't as big now." 

"Thanks," Liam says. 

They sit again for a while. Liam puts his head on Brett's shoulder and seems to be dozing off before the timer starts to beep, alerting them that it's time for Liam's next dose.  
Brett gets the pill off the table. "Here," he murmurs. "One at a time."

He watches, breath baited, as Liam swallows down the first half, taking a deep breath in the aftermath. 

_Please don't get sick_ , Brett thinks desperately. _Please, please don't get sick._

But Liam takes the next one without incident and hands the water bottle back to Brett. He looks pretty miserable - he's still sitting cross-legged and holding the bucket, but it's been a little more than an hour since he puked.

Brett motions at the bucket. “You done?”

“Mm. Yeah, think so.” Liam begins uncrossing his legs. “I’m gonna keep it next to the bed, though.”

“Sure,” Brett says easily. “Hey. Here.” He passes Liam a cup of water. “Have a little more water and go back to bed, okay? I’ll take care of it.”

“Brett…”

Brett nudges the water closer, and Liam finally relents, draining the cup of water and then giving Brett a small, grateful smile. “Thank you.”

“Anytime.” He watches as Liam gets up and slides back under the covers, in Brett's spot, closing his eyes tiredly.

Brett's heart throbs. Liam's so sick and unable to help himself that it's actually fucking scary. And he knows Liam's on the mend, slowly, that the more he's off the codeine, the better he'll feel. But it's scary to watch Liam lose weight and sleep his days away because he's just too tired to do anything else.

He empties the bucket, rinses it well, and takes it back to the bed, putting it down next to Liam. "There you go."

"Thanks," Liam says sleepily. "Hey, I'm sorry I'm boring. And useless."

Brett shakes his head as he climbs back into bed. "Hey, you're convalescent," he says.

"Whatever," Liam says. "Nerd."

Brett smiles a bit. At least Liam's joking with him. There is that.

~*~

He wakes before Liam does, which is hardly a shock, and starts up breakfast. He checks the time - it's been almost ten hours since Liam took his last codeine pill, which means it'll hopefully be out of his system.

When Liam does wake, he looks tired, still, but significantly more alert than he has for a while. Brett's not entirely sure how long the effects of codeine last, but he does know it takes almost twenty four hours to leave the system entirely.

"Hey," he says. "You reckon you can eat?"

Liam nods, surprising him, and gets up, coming to the fire. He's wincing a little, but his eyes are sharper today than they've been for ages.

"You look like you're awake," Brett says.

"I feel a lot better," Liam admits, and even his words aren't as slurred. "My side hurts, but it's nothing bad." 

Brett smiles. "Good," he says. "The codeine must be mostly out of your system by now."

"Can we... I dunno, can we go outside or something later?" Liam asks. 

"Yeah," Brett says. "Not far, though. Why?"

"I'm just bored," Liam says restlessly. "I just wanna get out. Stretch my legs or something. I mean I'll probably get about five feet and fucking collapse but it'd be nice to not be indoors for a while." 

"Okay," Brett says. "Yeah, we'll go out. Even if we just sit on one of the other houses' steps."

Liam bats his eyelids. "That's such a romantic date." 

Brett laughs. "Yeah, I know. I spent ages thinking of it." He looks down at Liam, who's poking at his oatmeal but actually eating it for once. He's still skinnier than usual, but his breathing is soft and even - nothing like the laboured gasping of the last few days - and he seems interested in talking and interacting. 

"Hey," Brett says. "Look." 

Liam looks around as Brett picks up the bear carving and smiles. "You finished it."

"Yep." Brett hands it over, watching Liam's hands and fingertips skim the points of the ears, the paws, and the head. 

"This is so cool," Liam murmurs. "Where'd you learn to do this?"

Brett blushes. Because Liam really does genuinely seem to think it's cool; he's turning it over, admiring all the tiny knife marks, the pinpricks that make up the eyes and nostrils in the snout - even the detail Brett tried to add for fur.

"My dad taught me," Brett says. "It was all I did after he died. I had so many cuts on my hands and fingers my mom used to wrap me up in bandages and tell me off for it. But she never really tried to stop me. I reckon I made dozens of them."

"What'd you make?" Liam's still inspecting the handiwork; his eyes are alight from the inside. Brett's happy to have cheered him up a bit.

"Anything," he says. "I made - let's see. The first thing I made was a ferret or something. It was easy enough to do. Then I started making dogs, and cats, moved on to wolves and horses. And after a while I started trying to give them expressions, you know? So that they didn't all look the same. I wanted them to be unique." 

Liam smiles, tipping his head. "This one looks happy." 

He's surprised Liam can identify that; he didn't think he was very clear about it. "Yeah, he's supposed to be," he says. "How'd you know?"

Liam shrugs. "His ears are up. Seriously, this is cool. You could've had like an Etsy business or something making this stuff. Or a market stall or something. You ever think about that?"

"I didn't do it much in college," Brett says. "It was sort of hard, between studying and lacrosse and a girlfriend. And she never understood my fascination with stabbing away at a piece of wood anyway - her words, not mine."

Liam tilts his head. "Seems like a crappy thing to say, considering your dad taught you," he says. "Was it like a way to feel close to him?"

"Yeah," Brett admits.

"Hmm." Liam puts the bear on the tabletop. "He's majestic. What's his name?" 

Brett's kind of grateful Liam not only seems to understand what these carvings mean to him, but also that he doesn't really want to talk in-depth about it. "You name him."

"Mason," Liam says instantly.

"Mason?" Brett chuckles. 

"Yeah. Mason." Liam looks at him. "Mason was my best friend," Liam says. "The last time I saw him a herd was after our group. I don't know what happened to him, but I'm kind of hoping he's okay. Even if that's dumb." 

"If that's dumb, so is me hoping my mom and sister are alive," Brett says. 

Liam shrugs. "I figure anyone who survived this long has probably ended up in a community, you know? I don't think there are many people like me - that found a place like this and just hunkered down by themselves. People need people. So maybe my friends and your family will be at Oakridge when we get there. And if they're not I'll help you find them."

"Liam," Brett says softly.

"Mm?" Liam turns to look at him.

"I just..." Brett shakes his head. "I don't know how to thank you," he says.

"For what?" Liam asks. "I haven't done anything."

The most stunning part about that is that Liam really doesn't think he's done anything noteworthy. He doesn't think what he's done for Brett is anything special.

"Liam," he says softly, "do you know what those guys wanted?"

"There was only one guy," Liam says. "You kept ranting on about "them" but you wouldn't tell me who they were."

"The Keeper who tried to rape you and Trent were working together," Brett says quietly. "They took me because they wanted to get to you. They were going to sell you into slavery and turn me into food."

Liam's gone white. "They were what?"

"They were cannibals, Liam. When you came for me, all I could think about was that it was you they were really after, not me." 

Liam swallows; he looks scared. "They were... gonna sell me?"

"Yeah." 

"Like... as in..."

"Yeah." 

"And they were going to... eat you?" Liam asks.

"Yep. That's why I refused the food. It smelled weird. Not like any of the meat we've ever had."

Liam shuffles closer to Brett, looking disturbed. "Well, I'm glad we got out of there, then."

"That's what I'm getting at. I wouldn't have if it hadn't been for you. And you found me so fucking fast."

"I didn't," Liam says. "It took me almost ten hours. I think you got knocked out." He shakes his head. "I wanted to check you for a concussion. And then Trent stabbed me."

"I was fine," Brett says quietly. "I probably had a mild concussion, but nothing serious. Besides, I didn't sleep much. Had to make sure you didn't bleed out."

"Would I have?"

"Without stitches and bandages, probably." Brett shakes himself. "I don't wanna talk about you nearly dying, okay?" he asks softly. "I don't wanna keep reliving it. You're here now and that's all that matters."

Liam nods. "Okay." 

Liam's remarkably good at understanding when he's offered so few words that would allow him to do so. Brett's grateful for that; he doesn't like people knowing when he's in pain, when he's sad, when he's hurting or sick. He's never understood people who wanted to be coddled in those situations; he'd much rather curl up and wait it out on his own.

He nods at Liam's bowl of oatmeal. "Finish your breakfast and we'll go out," he says with a small smile. "Fresh air would probably do us both good." 

With the motivation of getting to go outside, Liam polishes off his oatmeal quickly and soon, he's getting dressed. It still seems to be painful - he's been wearing sweats and a zip-up hoodie over bare skin for a few days now, just so he doesn't have to climb in and out of a shirt. 

"Hey," Brett says. "Leave the hoodie on, just use your jacket over the top. You should be fine." He finds Liam's jeans, knowing there's no way the sweatpants will break the wind and cold effectively. "Here."

He helps Liam step into them - he knows Liam could probably do it on his own, but there's no sense in leaving him to struggle along with the pain in his side if he can help in any way. After that, Liam ties up his shoes.

Brett surveys him. He still looks pretty pale, even though there are a few patches of colour returning slowly to his face. Brett notices a light smattering of bristle on Liam's jawline and smiles.

"You're gonna have to shave soon." He passes his palm over the bristles. "Getting stubble again." 

Liam follows the path of his hand. "Maybe people will stop thinking I'm a kid if I let it grow."

Brett wants to tell Liam that other things give him away in that regard - he might be muscular, but he's visibly not done growing into his frame yet, and his skin is too smooth and wrinkle-free for him to be any older than eighteen. Even Brett's got crow's feet in his eyes when he smiles. But he doesn't, because Liam needs to feel safe right now.

"Alright," he says. "You ready?"

"Definitely." Liam stands up and takes a knife and handgun off the table.

"No crossbow?" Brett asks.

Liam shakes his head. "The crossbow's heavy. I don't think I could carry it for very long right now."

Brett nods. Liam's muscles are probably weak from a combination of disuse and illness, and the movement required would involve a lot of pulling on his side and stitches anyway. "Good plan." 

Liam might be stubborn, but he's also smart - he doesn't do things he know will set him back. 

They exit the house, and Liam leads the way down the steps. Brett watches him carefully, but he can't see any sign that the steps are jarring; Liam seems fine. At least for now.

"It's warmer out," Liam says, seeming surprised.

"Yeah." Brett matches Liam's pace, which is kind of slow and meandering and not very purposeful. "I think winter's finally on its way out, which is nice. Might not have to freeze every time we go out now."

Liam nods. He's got his hands in his pockets, and he's shivering a little bit, but he seems alright. 

It's strange. Five days ago, Liam was hovering on the threshold of death's door, and Brett was convinced that giving him a morphine overdose might've been the kindest thing he could have done. Even three days ago, it was hard to get Liam to eat anything, or even drink. Now, Liam's wandering along beside him, seeming almost no worse for wear.

Brett shakes his head, reminds himself that Liam's seventeen. He's seen adults in better health linger and die from infections; Liam's young and he bounces back fast. Still, he has to remember that a stab wound is a pretty traumatic injury and not to push Liam too hard. If the infection comes back, he's fucked - the antibiotics are last-resort medications. Liam's body will be almost immune to them by the time he's done.

He still can't believe Liam's luck, really. Stabbed in the chest, just under his ribs, and not only did the knife somehow manage to miss his stomach and lungs, it also seems to have glanced off the bottom part of Liam's ribcage. It would explain why Liam's breathing sometimes seems so painful and shuddery - the knife missed vital organs, but it did slice through a few layers of muscle and fat that probably hurt every time Liam breathes too deeply.

"What're you thinking about?" Liam asks him curiously. "You've been staring at me for like five minutes." 

Brett wraps an arm around Liam's shoulders and tugs him in close. "Just happy you're okay." He pulls them to a complete stop so he can hug Liam properly. "I dunno what I would've done without you."

Liam hugs him back slowly. "You would've gone to Oakridge," he says. "That was the plan all along." 

Brett rests his chin on the top of Liam's head, letting the short blonde strands tickle his nose incessantly. "I wouldn't have made it without you." 

"Yeah you would've." Liam steps back. "Not that it matters now. I'm coming with you after all."

Brett smiles, looks into Liam's eyes - who bravely maintains eye contact, even though he ducks his head like he's tempted to look away. Liam's not very good with eye contact. When he does manage it, though, Brett makes sure to get a good look at the bright, ocean-blue colour. It seems strange to him now that Liam's eyes ever intimidated him.

"Yeah," he says. "I'm glad." Then, taking pity on Liam - who clearly wants to break eye contact - he leans down and gives him a soft, closed-mouth kiss. "Enjoying the walk?"

"Mhm." Liam's cheeks are flushed - with cold or bashfulness, Brett can't tell. 

Brett lets his mind wander a little. He's not sure what Oakridge will be like. Maybe he and Liam will be able to hunker down somewhere together. Liam will probably be eighteen by the time they get there; there'd be no point in fostering him with a family, which is what Brett's old group used to do. 

There might be limited electricity, he thinks hopefully. If they have solar panels or generators. He hopes so, anyway. And they could both get checked out by a doctor. See that they're both holding up okay. It hasn't been that long for Brett, but it's been ages for Liam. 

"Brett?"

Brett looks towards Liam, who's slowing to a stop. "Yeah?"

"Can we go back?" He realises, now, that Liam looks tired. "Sorry. My side hurts."

"Yeah, of course," Brett says, turning back to him. "You want me to piggyback you?" 

Liam smiles a little. "Maybe not yet. Kinda nice to walk around, even if it does hurt."

"Alright," Brett says uncertainly. "But if it gets too painful, let me know. I'll find a shopping trolley or something."

"What?" Liam laughs. "What the fuck does a shopping trolley have to do with any of this?"

"I can push you in it."

"You aren't pushing me in a fucking shopping trolley," Liam chuckles. "Jesus." He's flushed from laughing now. "You're insane."

"It was a good idea!" Brett whines.

Liam winces, even though he's still laughing. "Fuck, stop making me laugh. It hurts."

Brett shakes his head and kneels down. "Come on. Piggyback." 

Liam chuckles and climbs onto Brett's back, much easier this time than last time. "I could get used to this," he teases. "You carrying me around."

Brett grunts as he stands up and starts moving, holding the undersides of Liam's thighs, which are squeezing his hips tightly. "Yeah?" he pants. "You're not exactly light, you know."

"You callin' me fat?" Liam asks.

"I'm calling you heavy," Brett groans. "Fuck, you're like five foot five on a good day, how the hell do you weigh this much?"

"I don't weigh that much," Liam says timidly. "Maybe one forty?"

"One forty?" Brett demands. "Maybe when you were fifteen, Li. I reckon you're about one sixty now, maybe one sixty five." 

"Is that bad?"

"No. You're built like a fucking tank. A small tank," Brett amends. "Maybe a baby tank."

"Fuck you," Liam grumbles moodily. "How much do you weigh?"

"Oh... one eighty five? One ninety?" 

"What?" Liam whines. "Why do you weigh so much more than me?"

"Liam, I'm four years older than you and eight inches taller," Brett says, amused. "Besides, one sixty for someone your age and height is pretty good I reckon. Must've been all that surviving you did that built your muscles up."

"Not that I can use them right now," Liam says miserably.

"Hey, you'll get better," Brett says.

Liam nods, but he doesn't respond, and when Brett says something else, Liam just tucks his face in against Brett's neck. He doesn't feel like talking, apparently.

When they get back, Brett lowers Liam to the ground gently. He winces a little when he gets put down, but he seems alright to take his jacket off himself. Brett helps him out of his shoes and jeans.

"Why's it still hurting so much?" Liam asks. "I can tell the skin healed."

"Yeah, it did," Brett says. "But I think - well, I'm not entirely sure, because I'm not a trauma surgeon or anything. But based on the fact that it didn't pierce your stomach or lung, I'm guessing the knife kind of..." Brett traces the action on Liam's chest. "Kind of curved up, went in diagonally, maybe glanced off a rib." He continues to follow the imagined path of motion the blade took. "But even though it missed your organs, it still cut through a few layers of muscle and fat, and those are gonna take longer to heal."

He pauses. Liam's nipple has hardened and peaked in interest, and there are shivers racing up and down his torso where Brett's been touching him. When Brett looks up, Liam's faintly red, but meets his eyes.

"Sorry," he offers. "Feels nice." 

Brett nods, trying to think of the right thing to say. "You... is it sensitive here like your neck is?"

Liam nods. 

After a moment's hesitation, Brett uses his thumb to brush Liam's nipple, his fingers splayed out over the top part of Liam's ribcage. Liam shivers a little more forcefully this time, closing his eyes softly. 

Brett continues to play gently. Liam seems to be enjoying himself, at any rate, and he's not pulling away. He's chewing on his lower lip a little, shifting where he's sitting. 

Brett realises Liam's getting hard around the same time Liam realises and starts to pull away. "Sorry," he says quickly. "I didn't-"

"It's okay," Brett says, surprised. "I wanted you to feel good."

"Yeah, but you're not the one who's gonna have to go jerk off later," Liam says with a weak smile.

"Well, you don't have to jerk off," Brett says. "But I'll stop if you want me to."

Liam nods. "Yeah. For now. Maybe later."

Brett nods back, smiles. "Okay."

~*~

Brett checks Liam's pulse before he leaves.

Liam's out cold. Brett knew it would happen - the Meropenem and Vancomycin, administered on their own, make him drowsy. When the doses happen to line up and take place at the same time, they knock him out cold, usually for at least eight hours.

It's the third time Brett's done this now, but he's still nervous. He checks Liam's pulse - steady - his bandages, which are clean and fresh, and makes sure he's tucked up under the covers. He's not vomiting anymore now that he's off the codeine, so he doesn't have to find a way to tip Liam onto his side.

He bends down and gives Liam a kiss on the forehead before grabbing his pack and weapons and leaving, making sure to close the door quietly behind him. 

It usually takes him twenty minutes to trek to the warehouse, but he's feeling antsy today, and the weather is a little better, so it takes him less. He opens the door and enters quietly.

Trent looks at him from the pole, eyes glaring at him. 

Okay, so the thing is, Brett doesn't know what to do with Trent. He can't just kill him, although he's not sure why, considering how close Liam came to death after their encounter. But he can't let Trent go, either, because he knows Trent will try to finish the job. 

"Hi," Brett says.

"How's your boyfriend?" Trent sneers.

"He's great. We went for a walk today." Brett sits down across from Trent. "His fever broke a few days ago. He's gonna be fine." 

"I'm so thrilled," Trent mutters.

Brett shrugs. "Hey. You attacked us. This is your own fault." He shifts. "Anyway, I just came to tell you - we're gonna be leaving the city soon. Once he's better."

Trent seems to think he's joking for a moment. When he realises Brett isn't, he looks kind of worried. "Leaving?"

"Yep. And I don't think I really need to tell you, but you aren't coming with us."

Trent watches him coldly. "What are you going to do with me, then?"

"Leave you," Brett says simply. 

"What?"

"I'm leaving you here. Nobody's coming for you. If they were they would've done it by now."

"You can't leave me tied up here!" Trent says incredulously.

Fury surges through Brett's mind and before he can control it, he's standing up and snarling, "You stabbed my friend. You tried to fucking kill him. You almost did. I can't even tell you how many times he's nearly died in the last week. And you say I can't leave you here? I can and I'm gonna." 

"I bet he doesn't like that," Trent says.

"He doesn't know and I'm not going to tell him," Brett says heatedly. "He doesn't need to know what happened to you, he needs you to be dead. You think I'm dumb? I let you go and you'll not only come back, you'll bring other people down on top of us."

"But you aren't gonna kill me," Trent says easily. 

"I just told you I'm not gonna kill you," Brett says. "Fuck, do you listen to anything?" 

"Your little buddy killed mine," Trent says coldly.

"Oh, for fuck's sake. He didn't kill him. A zombie did. Or karma did, whichever way you want to look at it." Brett shakes his head. "I'm not here to argue with you, anyway," he mutters. "Just letting you know we're going."

"You know when we lived with the Keepers, they trained us how to get out of ropes," Trent says.

"How's that going for ya?" Brett grumbles. 

There's a moment of silence, and then, quite suddenly, Trent's up and lunging at Brett, and the ropes on his wrists are gone. Brett yells with surprise, aims his gun, and fires, but it misses and hits one of the steel beams instead.

_That probably alerted every zombie to where we are_ , he thinks, freaking the fuck out. _Fuck my life._

"You never," Trent snarls, advancing on Brett, "should have considered leaving me alive."

"I won't this time," Brett growls back.

"Oh please. Your friend had to save your ass last time. And last time I checked, I ran him through like a kebab, so I'm guessing he's not on his way to help you out of this one."

Brett lunges, sending Trent sprawling onto the ground, and draws his fist back, swinging straight down into Trent's nose. Yeah, Brett might not be that skilled a fighter - but he's big and well-fed and Trent is neither.

He manages to get another hit before Trent rolls him over and, very suddenly, has the upper hand. At that point, Trent's in control of the gun and Brett bellows in pain as the butt of it is smashed into his skull.

He reels for a moment, dazed, his ears ringing with the shock. But he needs to get back up, keep moving, and so he manages to get his knees at Trent's chest and pushes, sending him flying back. In the struggle, the gun goes flying, skitters across the floor.

Of course.

That's when Brett hears it - the unmistakable groan of a hunting zombie. He looks around, behind himself first, and then to the sides, can't see it-

And Trent bellows. When Brett whips around, there's a mark on his arm, his hand, where the zombie munched on him, and Brett doesn't even know how it got that close - Trent's run it through the head with a wooden sliver before Brett can react.

The zombie falls, and they both pant harshly for a moment. Trent lifts his arm up to the light, expression frozen, face white. The teeth marks couldn't possibly be more obvious - and they're deep, too, almost to the bone.

They stare at Trent's arm. Stare at it for three or four seconds before Brett's undoing his belt and saying, "Lie on the floor, I'll amputate it-"

And, before he finishes his sentence, Trent's taken the gun, put it under his chin, and shot himself clear through the skull.

Brett falls back, trembling. He can't believe what he just witnessed - and he doesn't know if it's cruel or kind, that the universe took care of Trent for him just when Brett was finding it in himself to want to let him go. He doesn't miss the mirror image of Trent's friend and Liam's would-be rapist meeting the same exact fate, either.

He stands up slowly, touches his head. He's bleeding, but he wasn't hit hard enough to be concussed, he doesn't think.

All he wants is to get back to Liam. Liam, who's a small bright spot in the darkness - the only person Brett knows is still alive. The only person Brett knows won't hurt him. The only person Brett knows it's worth being hurt for.

And so he heads home. He doesn't know what to do with the body, so he leaves it there, thankful, at the very least, that he's never going to have to go back to that place. It's the place he and Liam both nearly met their ends, and now, he'll never have to revisit it.

When he steps inside, Liam's still sleeping. He's rolled onto his back; the bag of Meropenem is empty, and Liam's arm is outstretched, towards the door.

Brett sits down, and, after a moment's deliberation, strokes Liam's hair lightly. Liam doesn't stir; the drugs have knocked him right out this time around. He's not even twitching. 

He debates over whether or not to remove the needle for the IV, but Liam's sleeping pretty soundly, and Brett doesn't want him to wake up. So he sits and watches Liam breathe, listens to the sound - even. Clear. Liam's getting better, especially now that he's off the codeine pills.

Trent's dead. He's never going to be a threat to Liam again. But the remaining Keepers might be; they have to go soon. Brett wanted to wait at least another month, make sure Liam doesn't strain himself, but that might not be possible for much longer. 

_Maybe we can find a car_ , Brett thinks as he sits near the fire. _If I drove, Liam could still rest. Sleep on the way, maybe._

He's startled when Liam suddenly stirs, groans, and turns his head.

"Brett?" he asks sleepily.

"Hey." 

Liam sits up slowly. "Why're you dressed?" he asks slowly. "Are you - you're fucking bleeding!"

Brett touches his head gingerly. "Yeah. A little."

"What the fuck happened?" 

Brett looks up; Liam's flinging the covers back and scrambling out of bed. "Liam - Liam, don't - fuck, Liam." Liam's ripped out his IV and he's stumbling across the room. 

"What happened?" Liam demands. He's searching for a cloth, eventually picking up one of the clean ones and dragging a bucket of water towards them. "How'd you get hurt?" In the next second, he's pressing the cloth against Brett's head gently, worrying at his lip.

Brett hesitates. Then, he decides to tell the truth - because eventually, lies always come to the surface.

"I got into a fight."

Liam's jaw drops. "What the fuck?" he demands. "When?" 

"Just now." He shakes his head. "I've been - whenever your doses sync up I've been going to the warehouse where Trent kept me. Where I'm, uh, sort of keeping Trent." 

Liam freezes. There's a long pause.

"You're _what_?" Liam hisses.

Brett flinches; Liam sounds livid. "He wasn't dead," he says. "When you knocked him with the brick, you just knocked him out. I went back to see if he'd escaped, and he hadn't. I didn't know what to do with him. I couldn't kill him. So I trussed him up to a pole."

"You what?" Liam yells.

_At least he's alive enough to yell_ , Brett thinks ruefully. _And this is proof the knife didn't get his lungs, too._

"Let me get this straight - you tied up a sadistic, paedophilic, cannibalistic slave trafficker to a pole and don't know what to do with him?" Liam demands. "You could've just left him there to die!"

"Liam," Brett begs. "I didn't know if he'd get out of the ropes or not. I had to make sure. I had to. If he'd gotten free he could've come for us - there was no way you would've survived being attacked again, I had to make sure. I had to make sure he wasn't going to hurt you again." 

Liam swallows, but he doesn't seem like he's going to yell anymore. "Now what do we do with him?"

"We?" Brett asks.

"Yes, we. We meaning I didn't die and now it's my problem too. We're in this together. Dick." But Liam's hands are gentle, even if he is admonishing Brett. "Fuck, he hit you hard. You're bleeding pretty bad." 

"It's fine." Brett shakes his head a bit, then holds still when Liam makes a vaguely scolding noise. "We don't have to do anything."

"Oh, come on, yes we do-"

"No, we don't," Brett says. "He got bitten."

Liam pauses. "He..."

"Got free, belted me, then, as he was gonna finish it, I dunno, he got bitten." Brett swallows. "I offered to amputate it for him. Words were barely out of my mouth when he shot himself."

Liam closes his eyes, his hands going still.

"Liam?"

"Just shut up and let me think," Liam mumbles as he keeps moving to clean Brett's face up. 

Brett gives Liam some time to think about what he's just been told. Eventually, he sighs, sits back, and says, "I know he was a terrible person. But nobody... nobody deserves to be bitten. To go like that."

"You still believe that?" Brett asks softly.

"I have to." Liam shakes his head. "It's all we've got left, Brett."

"What is?"

Liam hesitates for a moment. Then, softly, "Compassion, I guess."

Brett nods a little. Liam sighs, pulls the rag back.

"Come closer to the fire," he murmurs. "I need to clean you up."

~*~

Brett's not even annoyed when he's dragged out of a fitful doze by Liam groaning nearby.

It's not like he was sleeping well anyway; at least this gives him something to do. He levers himself upright, blearily, and says, "Liam?" 

"Yeah," Liam groans back. "I'm sorry."

"What's up?" Brett's trying to get a closer look at him, but Liam sleeps near the wall and that's away from the fire; he's also turned over, away from Brett, curled up in a ball.

Brett suddenly knows the problem is Liam's side when he notices Liam's got a hand pressed against it; there's a wince of pain etched into his face. Brett sits up properly. "What's up?" he asks again. "Does it hurt?" 

"Yeah," Liam breathes. "Pretty bad. It woke me up." 

"Muscles? Or stitches?"

"Muscles, I think." Liam swallows. "They feel all cramped up."

"Uh... okay." Brett blinks the sleep away from his eyes. "Let's-"

Liam's starting to sit up, still grimacing with pain. "Go back to sleep," he breathes. "I'll be fine."

"Hey, no," Brett murmurs. "You don't have to do this on your own."

Liam smiles a little. "I'm not," he says. "You're right here. But I don't really think there's much you can do." Liam shakes his head. "I'm just gonna have some water and Tylenol and hope that helps I guess."

"Alright," Brett murmurs uncertainly. "But if you need anything..."

"I'll tell you." 

He listens to Liam moving around quietly for a bit, finds himself drifting off to the noise. It's sort of nice to hear the sound of life nearby, even if it is just Liam, pottering around near the fire.

He thinks it's about an hour later when the covers pull back and Liam climbs into bed behind him. Brett smiles sleepily when Liam nestles up against his back and slings a leg over his hips.

"Best jetpack ever," Brett says drowsily.

Liam snorts a little. "Totally. A jetpack with a hole in it."

"You okay?" Brett queries.

"Yeah. All better. Go back to sleep."

Brett drifts off to the sensation of Liam's breath on the back of his neck.

~*~

When Brett wakes, it's because Liam's left hand is pressing into the dip of his waist, gently, his lips trailing across Brett's shoulders.

Brett smiles sleepily, pretends to still be asleep as Liam's lips begin making their way down Brett's spine. He sighs comfortably, rolls his shoulders, and Liam gives him a gentle squeeze. 

"Morning," Liam says huskily.

Brett rolls over, immediately finding himself with an armful of Liam, pressing against his chest and smiling. "Morning," he murmurs. "That was a nice way to wake up." 

Liam's moving, now, and Brett sighs as Liam's lips attach themselves to his collarbone, leaving a trail of slightly damp kisses across them. He holds the back of Liam's neck gently; he's not sure anything has ever felt this good.

Liam's been off the drugs for about three days now with no incident. He's still in pain sometimes, but mostly he seems to have healed up, and with his newfound health has come a plethora of extra benefits... including but not limited to a newer, friskier side of him Brett didn't know existed.

He supposes he should have; Liam's seventeen, after all, and hasn't had sex in years. So the fact that Liam is now palming at Brett through his boxers and determinedly kissing his way south shouldn't come as a surprise - but it does, and a nice one at that.

"Where're you going?" Brett murmurs.

Liam looks up from where he's just reached Brett's belly button and smiles. "Just following the treasure trail," he says innocently.

"Mmhm," Brett sighs. "You don't have to..."

Liam squeezes him gently, but firmly, and Brett's legs drop open of their own accord. Liam's next kiss feels like a smirk. 

"I suppose if you're offering, though," Brett breathes. "Sure." 

He feels Liam's hands tugging at his boxers, and he lets Liam pull them down. He bites his lip when Liam noses at the junction of his thigh and pelvis, trying to keep his breathing under control.

"What's wrong?" Liam murmurs innocently.

"Nothing," Brett breathes. 

His even breathing goes out the window when Liam strokes him, somewhat tentatively. He feels himself swelling up and groans aloud, not worried about Liam judging him; Liam seems to like him well enough to want to give him head, after all. 

"That feels great," he whispers encouragingly.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"I'm a little rusty," Liam admits.

"It all feels good to me." Brett rolls his hips up into Liam's grip lazily. "Hmm. You don't have to do this."

"I want to," Liam says, and then his mouth is around the head of Brett's cock and sliding down slowly.

"Oh, fuck," Brett moans. "Liam." 

Liam's hands tighten on his thighs encouragingly, his eyelashes flicking as he looks up at Brett with a mind-blowingly heated expression. Brett takes in the sight of Liam's shoulders, bare skin smooth and soft in the morning light, nestled in between his thighs. 

"I'm not gonna last long," he breathes.

Liam shrugs against him, tilts his head, and starts moving with a little more intent. Brett gnaws on his lip; Liam's mouth is sinfully hot and wet. Brett tries not to think about how hot and wet - and tight - it might be other places, but it's hard to stop his thoughts from straying.

He thrusts his hips up a little, and at first, Liam pulls back a bit - and then he seems to settle into it, changing the angle of his neck so that Brett can continue to thrust lazily and fuck, this is probably the best head he's ever had in his life. 

Liam's cheeks hollow out, and Brett groans urgently, feeling bolts of pleasure arcing up and down his spine, pooling heat in the pit of his belly. "Liam," he pants. "Liam, I'm gonna come." 

Liam nods a little, lifts his eyes to acknowledge what Brett's said. Brett reaches down and slides a hand into Liam's hair, the other on Liam's left shoulder, as he strains his hips. He just needs Liam to go a little faster, just for a moment-

Liam's left hand slides off his thigh and then there's a finger, tracing right below his balls, and Brett chokes out a cry as he comes, hard, in Liam's mouth. He feels Liam's throat tighten and realises Liam's swallowing.

_Fucking hell_ , he thinks weakly. It's only been three days since Liam's been well enough to remember he even has a sex drive. What next?

Liam keeps sucking until Brett's gone soft, then pulls away from him gently, sitting up. Brett watches the muscles in his back and shoulders strain lazily as he does; his hair is ruffled, and his lips - which are red and sort of puffy - are set in a satisfied smirk as he regards Brett.

"Morning," Liam says again. 

"That," Brett pants, "was the best head I've ever had." 

Liam chuckles. "Yeah? I'm flattered." He starts to get up, but Brett catches his waist and pulls him back. "Hey, what're you doing?"

"Stay here," Brett says, tucking his face into the small of Liam's back. "Come on. Stay in bed for a bit." 

Liam reaches out, takes a few swallows of water from the water bottle nearby, and then wriggles back under the covers with Brett. He seems pretty satisfied with himself, almost cocky, which is pretty hot. Brett wraps an arm around his shoulders and tugs him in close.

Liam hisses in pain, and Brett jumps back, realising a little too late that he's jostled Liam's wound. "Sorry," he says quickly.

"It's okay." Liam settles back against him; he smells warm, like sleep and home, and he's stretched out and relaxed against Brett like a big cat. "It's healing up pretty fast." 

Brett looks down at the wound. It's still a little red, but it's healed over, at least. The stitches should be able to come out soon. 

He smiles and caresses Liam's waist gently; Liam pushes into his hand. "Yeah. You look a lot better. Stronger," Brett says.

Liam smiles back at him. He really does look better - healthy, almost, with the bruises almost completely faded and the fever broken for good. He's managed to gain a little weight back - which Brett is sure will continue over the next few weeks. 

He huffs when Liam rolls up against him and settles in, his stomach and chest pressed against Brett's side. That's when he notices that Liam's hard against his thigh, and he smirks. 

Two can play at that game, he thinks, grabbing Liam's leg and shifting it so that he can slot his thigh into the convenient space left. Liam moves a bit, but before he can move away completely, Brett pushes his thigh against Liam's dick.

Liam goes lax against him, swallowing. "Hmm?" he asks.

"That's not a word, Li." He knows it's more of a question, a "is this okay?" and smiles as he palms at Liam's back and sides, feeling his muscles shift. "You've got a great body."  
"Thanks," Liam says, and Brett can feel his cheeks heating up. "Um... you don't have to, you know, return the favour or anything."

"Do you want me to?" Brett asks.

"Yeah. Kind of."

"Well, I want to as well." He tugs at Liam's sweats, admiring the way they sit on Liam's hips. "Hmm. I like your body."

"Stop," Liam mumbles, tucking his head close. 

Brett pushes at Liam's hips a little, encouraging him to lift up. He looks inside Liam's sweats, finds him hard inside his boxers, and smiles. "Been a while, huh?"

"You know it has," Liam whines, settling in closer to him. "You sure about this?"

Brett gives him a squeeze, watches as his eyelids flutter shut and his arms tense as he holds himself off Brett's chest, pushing his hips forward. "I'm sure," Brett says huskily. "You should get comfy. Where do you wanna be?" 

Liam opens his eyes dazedly, like he can't quite recall how he got into this situation. "Uh... on my back." 

Brett takes Liam's hips and presses him back into the mattress, smiling as he hooks his hands into Liam's sweats and boxers and pulls them down.

Liam's cut, not as long as Brett, but a little thicker. His dick curves gracefully towards his stomach, and outside his field of focus, Brett sees Liam's hips moving - he's shifting around a little bit, and when Brett looks up, Liam's blushing and squirming.

"What's wrong?"

"I've never been with anyone other than Garrett, remember?" Liam asks. "And I've never... been with someone so much older than me."

"Do you want me to stop?" Brett asks gently. 

"That's not what I'm saying at all," Liam says indignantly. "Does it look like I want you to stop?"

Brett chuckles. "Alright." He presses his thumbs into the sharp cut of Liam's hips briefly. Liam's still not quite done growing into his bone structure, but he will be pretty soon, Brett realises. He doesn't look quite as young as he did even three months ago.

He reaches down and grips Liam gently, causing him to whine a little. He keeps his free hand on Liam's hip, pressing him down into the bed. Liam's other hip tilts upwards, throwing the wound on his side into the light. 

It doesn't seem to be bothering him today. Still, Liam deserves to feel good, for once, so Brett tightens his grip until he hears Liam sigh shakily, then starts moving.

"How do you like it?" Brett murmurs. "I've never done this. You're gonna have to give me instructions."

Liam grins at him a little, opening his eyes. "What, you've never jerked off before? It's pretty much the same." 

Brett swallows convulsively. "Yeah, but everyone's different, right? Some people like it slow, some people like fast, some people-"

Liam whimpers as Brett's thumb drags over the head of his dick; a few beads of precome appear at the top. Brett grins to himself.

"Some people like that." He leans down, not expecting Liam's knees to come up around his ribcage, ankles down near Brett's hips somewhere, and fucking squeeze like a python. He gasps in surprise as the air's pretty much forced out of him.

"Fuck," he says. "You're strong." 

"Not exactly the dirty talk I was going for," Liam breathes. "Sorry." He loosens up a little bit, and Brett manages to shift in closer, forcing Liam's legs back a little. He doesn't seem to mind; he's straining up against Brett's hand again.

"What happens if I force you back down?" Brett asks casually.

"I'll come. Probably."

"Well, don't want that to happen just yet." He begins speeding up; Liam bites down on his lip desperately. "You look good like this."

Liam's knees squeeze him again; he really is pretty fucking strong, Brett reflects. He could definitely get used to Liam's muscle mass and his strength and the squeezing power of another guy beneath him - yeah, he could definitely get on board with that.

If he could get hard again this fast, he probably would be already. Instead he settles for making sure Liam's having a good time. He's making sure to smear the precome around the tip, and Liam seems pretty into that - he also doesn't seem to be able to stay still at all. 

"Tell me when you're close," Brett says.

"I'm close," Liam says immediately, and Brett restrains a laugh. "Ah, fuck." Liam's wriggling again, and now, he's sliding his legs all the way around Brett's waist. "That feels so good."

Brett swallows. "Can I touch you where you touched me?" he asks quietly.

"Yes please," Liam groans.

He reaches down, hesitantly, searching for that spot just behind Liam's balls - to be honest, Brett didn't know it existed until today, but it felt amazing, so-

"Brett, I'm gonna come," Liam moans.

Brett speeds up and presses down, uses his nail to scratch just a little, and Liam's breathing stalls, his head tilted back into the pillow, and Brett can feel his dick start to pulse-  
He leans down and attaches his mouth to Liam's throat, sucking like he could drink Liam's blood and live off it, and Liam's groaning as he falls apart underneath Brett's weight.

Brett feels Liam's come seeping over his knuckles, but he doesn't let up, only softens his grips and slows down a little as Liam grows softer in his hand. He doesn't want to hurt him, just... overstimulate him a little. 

He doesn't stop sucking Liam's neck until Liam's knees slacken around him. That's when he moves away gently, sitting back and admiring his work - Liam's flushed from the chest up, striped with his own come, and has a series of deep purple marks on his throat.

"Fuck," Brett says. "You look great like this." 

Liam laughs a little, then winces, moving his hand to his side. "Yeah. Wasn't good for my stitches, though."

"I'd check, but..." 

Liam chuckles. "Yeah. Don't worry." He leans back a little. "That felt amazing," he sighs.

"You sure it's not just because it hasn't happened in years?" Brett teases.

Liam smiles. "Well. That too."

Brett stands up, goes to wash his hands, and brings back a wet cloth for Liam. He's careful not to get it anywhere near Liam's stitches - he's not sure how sterile the tap water is. He's kind of surprised they still have it. 

"You don't have to do that," Liam says, even as he stretches lazily. "Thanks, though."

"No problem." Brett peers outside as he wipes Liam's stomach absently. "Sunny out. Reckon the snow will start to melt soon?"

"It should," Liam says. "I think this time last year it did. Not that I really know what time of year it is exactly, but you get my point." He pulls his pants up, finds Brett watching him. 

"What?" he asks self-consciously. "Did I make too much noise?"

Brett smiles. "You sounded great, Liam."

"Oh, okay," Liam sighs. "Good. Garrett used to make fun of me because I couldn't shut the fuck up." He tilts his head. "So what're you looking at, then?"

Brett lies down beside him, on his stomach. "Two weeks ago," he says quietly, "I was - I was getting ready to face the fact that you might die. That no matter what I did, it might not be enough."

Liam's expression softens; he leans up on his arm and looks down at Brett. "I didn't," he says softly. "I'm right here."

"I just..." Brett rolls onto his back, reaches out, and pulls Liam gently against him. "I can't stop thinking about how sick you were. I didn't want to give you morphine, because I was scared that the pain was the only thing keeping you alive."

Liam blinks. "But... you did give me morphine," he says slowly. "I remember it."

Brett nods.

"Why?"

Brett runs his fingers up and down Liam's spine, admiring the way it causes goosebumps to rise to the surface. "If you were gonna... go," he says quietly, "I didn't want you to be in pain." 

Liam swallows, playing with a lock of Brett's hair. "I wasn't."

"You weren't?" Brett asks, surprised.

"No. I remember... I think I was telling you how to get to Oakridge? I wasn't in pain that time. I was pretty sure I was going to die once I went to sleep. You know they say you get those last few hours where everything is okay right before you die. I thought that was what it was. Makes sense that it was morphine now, though." 

"There were a few other times you woke up," Brett says. "How much do you remember?"

Liam looks upwards, gnawing his lip in thought. "Uh... you put me in the bath. I didn't get why at the time, but now I know it was because my fever was too high. After that... I woke up because I was in pain and I was completely convinced I'd been bitten and I kept wondering why you were trying to patch me up and save my life. And then the time I told you to get to Oakridge. I don't remember anything else."

Brett swallows and pulls Liam in closer to him. "You don't remember the worst bits," he murmurs. "That's good though."

Liam frowns. "The worst bits?"

Brett nods, but doesn't elaborate; if Liam doesn't remember being held down while Brett scraped the infected pus and flesh out of his wound, then redid the stitches, he's not going to remind him. It's traumatic enough for Brett to think about.

Liam's watching him, seems worried about the fact that Brett's on the cusp of tears, again, for crying out loud. "I think we should go back to jerking each other off," he says hesitantly.

Brett laughs wetly, wiping his eyes. "You're ready again? Already?"

Liam shrugs. "I could be. Old man." He rolls onto his back. "Nah, I actually thought - we should probably go out today. I barely have any clothes left after the last few weeks."

He's got a point there; plus, the weather's gonna be getting warmer, too, which means they're going to have to shed their jackets and thermal shirts.

"Reckon we should switch to shorts for summer?" Brett asks.

"Fuck no," Liam mumbles, standing up and stretching a little, wincing. "I did that last summer - the bug bites nearly killed me, I swear."

Brett smiles, reaches out, grabs Liam's hips, and pulls him in close, resting his chin on Liam's stomach and looking up at him. "Looks like you recovered," he says innocently.

Liam's started blushing again, furiously. "Fuck you. Every time you talk to me I go red."

"How can you tell?"

"I can feel it," Liam grumbles. 

Brett laughs. "Noted. Liam knows when he's blushing." He tugs Liam's waist. "I think it's cute."

"I don't wanna be cute," Liam huffs as he heads to the table and pulls a shirt on. "Cute is not what I'm going for."

"What're you going for?"

Liam's bristling, but he seems to know Brett's teasing him. "I dunno," he snarks. "Alive is a good starting point." 

"Good," Brett says pleasantly. "Well, you're alive. Now you can go about being cute."

Liam throws a pillow at him.

~*~

"I'm so sick of snow," Liam groans.

Brett chuckles; Liam's having a lot more trouble, with his shorter stature, stomping along in the snow than Brett is. "I know you are," he says.

They're on their way to Nordstrom; Liam's keeping a pretty good pace, although it's nowhere near as brutal as what it was. He's stopped a few times, massaging his ribs and looking torn between irritation and discomfort, but never for long, and his breathing sounds fine.

"Seriously. I fucking hate snow." Liam kicks it moodily as he walks. "It's not even great. It just turns to slush when it's not fresh. The only thing it's good for is water."

"Want me to carry you?" Brett asks absently.

"What? Why?"

"So you don't have to deal with the snow."

Liam rolls his eyes. "I will deal with the snow just fine," he says.

"And loudly," Brett quips. "Wanna have a snowball fight? I'd let you win. You'd feel better."

"There's no satisfaction in winning a rigged fight," Liam huffs.

Brett smiles. "Yeah. I know. That's why you stopped playing Uno with me when I was sick, because you kept seeing my cards."

"At least you know I'm... uh... what's the word? It starts with I. Inc...?"

"Incorrigible?" 

"That's the one."

"You used it wrong," Brett chuckles. "It means hopeless."

"Which is exactly what I am when I comes to academics," Liam says. "Oh well. Not like I have to take the SATs anytime soon, right?"

"Right." Brett steps ahead. "Walk in my footsteps; should be easier for you."

Liam falls behind him, and Brett at least feels useful to be keeping Liam out of the wind and making his trip a little easier. Liam continues to huff about the snow, but it's mostly just amusing. 

Once they're back on pavement, Liam strides ahead again. He prefers walking in front, which is fine by Brett, really. It means they know where they're going at any rate.

"You holding up okay?" Brett asks.

Liam stops and turns back to him, blinking. "Yeah?" he asks. "I mean - shouldn't I be?"

"No, it's good that you are." Brett watches him carefully as he starts to climb up a ladder; Liam really doesn't seem to be having trouble with his stab wound. He's a little more out of breath than what's normal, but he's also been mostly in bed for the last three weeks.

"Snow's melting," Brett comments.

Liam sighs. "Isn't it great?" he asks. "I mean wearing four layers isn't exactly good for moving fast, you know?"

"My ex used to wear tights under her jeans in winter," Brett says. "No such thing as easy access."

Liam turns to him and grins. "You'll never have to worry about that with me."

Brett chuckles. "No?"

"Nope. All you gotta do is ask me."

"Well, that's not that much fun either," Brett says. "It's fun to take them off you. You squirm."

Liam goes red around his ears and neck. "Shut up," he says, but he's smiling, and the inflected whine in his voice is playful. "I'm ticklish, okay?"

He's panting now; the ladder was pretty tall. "Sure you're okay?" Brett asks.

"Yeah. Just winded." Liam stands up straight, looking at him. "I've been on my back for, what, two out of the last three weeks? And not even in the way I like to be either."

Brett laughs, smiles, and reaches out to ruffle Liam's hair. "Well, all you had to do is say something. I mean, you being on your back - that can be arranged."

Liam smiles shyly. "Mhm."

Brett grins as Liam turns and starts to walk away from him - that, in Liam-speak, meant, "that sounds awesome but I'm also kinda shy". Which Brett thinks is pretty cute - and he can work with it.

"So?" Brett asks, jogging to keep up. "Do I have to wine and dine you?"

"Oh, God," Liam scoffs, even though the little smile is still on his face. "What with?"

"I dunno. You want squirrel? Deer? Raccoon? I mean, raccoon is kind of a delicacy this time of year, but I reckon I could wrangle it."

"I want a three course meal," Liam teases. "I'm not easy. You have to fucking work for it."

"Okay. So, entree, main course, and dessert, then?"

"Alright." Liam turns to him and narrows his eyes. "Thought there was wine involved in this?"

"You want me to get you shitfaced?" Brett chuckles. "Alright."

"I won't get shitfaced," Liam protests.

"Yes you will. You're like prairie-dog sized and you've never had a drink before."

"I am not fucking prairie-dog sized!" Liam splutters indignantly. "And - what if my tolerance is good?"

"Liam, the first time I drank, I apparently stole a sheet off my friend's clothesline and thought I was Superman."

Liam squints at him dubiously. "Apparently?" he asks hesitantly.

"I don't remember it," Brett admits. "My friend told me later. Apparently I lost several games of Uno, spilled a bottle of salt, and texted my mom saying hey, Mom, guess what? I'm testing the one tequila, two tequila, three tequila, floor theory." 

"Were you an alcoholic before this?" Liam asks suspiciously.

Brett laughs. "No. I just had very underdeveloped risk and reward centres."

"Whatever that means," Liam says flippantly. "So. How'd testing the theory go?"

"Well... I dunno. It was more like, one tequila, two tequila, three tequila, four tequila, five tequila, oh God what the fuck is happening to me." 

Liam laughs. "Alright. Well, I'm gonna stay the fuck away from that stuff, then." They round the corner, reaching the Nordstrom store. "Yay, clothes shopping."

"You sound thrilled," Brett notes.

"I hate clothes shopping," Liam says. "Mom used to drag me out all the time."

"Let me guess... you were one of those kids who wore the same three hoodies, five t-shirts and two pairs of jeans on a clever rotation in the hopes that nobody would notice you don't own anything else?" Brett asks.

Liam looks at him. "How'd you know?" When Brett laughs, Liam punches his shoulder lightly. "No, I'm serious!" he whines. "How'd you know? That's exactly what I was like!"

"I guessed," Brett teases. "I also know you, you dork. And I bet you got defensive about it too, huh?"

Liam looks stumped. "You're good," he says.

Brett shrugs. "I was into my third year of psych," he says.

"You were gonna be a psychologist?" Liam asks curiously.

"Nah, not really. I was taking the subject, but I was actually looking to go into law enforcement or social work. So I took a lot of psych, some forensics, stuff like that." 

"So you're smart is what you're saying," Liam says.

"I wasn't that smart," Brett says, feeling himself go red. "I was alright. Averaged a 3.7 GPA."

"Not smart," Liam scoffs. "Whatever." He heads over to a rack of t-shirts. "You know," he says over his shoulder, "one time I got ninety eight percent on a math test."

Brett chuckles. "Yeah?"

"Yup. I may or may not have spent two months in tutoring." Liam shrugs. "I'm not very smart." 

"You're smart," Brett says. "You know how many cases of dysentery we had at our camp because nobody thought to purify the water with iodine tincture?"

Liam blinks. "What's dysentery?"

"Shitting through the eye of a needle," Brett says, smiling when Liam flinches at the graphic imagery. "Yeah. It was fucked up."

"Did you get it?"

"That's private information," Brett says, and Liam snickers.

"You totally did. You're fucking disgusting." 

Brett grabs Liam's arms, picks him up, and dumps him a few feet away from the rack of clothes; Liam squirms and laughs. "Fuck you," Brett whines. "It was awful." 

"Well, at least you won't get it again," Liam says, smiling. 

Brett pulls a jacket off the rack. "Try this one," he says.

Liam puts his crossbow down and slides his other jacket off - it's kind of bloody and ripped up, even though they've both tried to salvage it. This one has the same shearling lining to it, but it's plain denim on the outside.

"Fits perfectly," Liam says, even though it's a little loose. Brett doesn't argue; Liam's got an ingrained habit of concealing as many weapons on him as is humanly possible, and he can't do that in a well-fitting jacket.

"How's your side?" Brett asks.

"It's okay," Liam says. "It's sore, but I'm holding up fine."

"Okay. You tell me when it starts to hurt worse, alright? We'll go back."

"Gotcha," Liam says. "Hey. These your size?" He tosses a pair of jeans to Brett.

"These are leather," Brett says when he catches them.

Liam snickers. "I know."

Brett shakes his head and dumps them back on the table. "Look, if you're holding up okay and we have time, I wanna go by the hospital," he says. "Get some more medical supplies. We're running low."

Liam stops. "The hospital?" he asks, visibly horrified.

"Yeah."

"We aren't going to the fucking hospital!"

Brett frowns. "Why not?"

"Because it's a fucking terrible idea!" Liam says. "It's probably crawling with munchers-"

"Liam," Brett says. "Hey. I went to the hospital to get your drugs; it had been cleared out. There's hardly any zombies there." He frowns again, looking at the blank expression on Liam's face. "You don't remember, do you?"

"No?" Liam asks uncertainly.

"I told you I was going," Brett murmurs. "You needed the drugs. They're hospital grade, they can't be found in small pharmacies like the ones we were looting." 

"I don't remember." Liam shakes his head. "I can't believe I let you go."

"Let me," Brett says. "Liam, you weren't in any condition to fight off a goddamn kitten. There was no way you would've been able to stop me." 

"Well I would've tried," Liam grumbles.

"I know you would have," Brett says. "You're the most belligerent, hard-headed person I've ever met."

"Thanks?"

"Don't mention it." 

~*~

The hospital isn't quite as creepy with Liam behind him.

Brett's taking point, because he actually knows where he's going; Liam's a few paces behind him, crossbow raised. His footsteps are silent, even against the tiles.

"So?" Liam asks. "What's the deal?"

"Loads of corpses when I came here," Brett says softly. "But the only zombies I saw were Keepers."

"Keepers?" Liam frowns. "How long had they been dead?"

"I didn't look. I was just trying to get you your medicine."

He turns around. Liam's stopped in the middle of the hallway, his crossbow still raised. He looks nervous as all hell, like he doesn't want to go another step further.

"Liam," Brett says. "What's wrong?"

Liam just shakes his head, stepping back a little. "This feels wrong," he says.

"What do you mean?"

Liam licks his lips, takes another step backwards. "Can we go somewhere else?" be pleads.

Brett hesitates. But Liam's intuition has never been wrong before, not once, even if that initially takes a while to become evident. So he nods slowly, starts back towards Liam, then has to hurry to keep up with him. 

Once they're a good mile from the hospital, Liam turns to him. "Thanks for believing me," he says weakly.

"What's going on, huh? Why're you tripping out?" Brett puts a hand on Liam's shoulder. This seems like more than a garden variety panic attack, especially considering Liam's got nerves of steel. "You can tell me."

"Something just felt bad," Liam says uneasily. "I can't explain it. But we shouldn't go back there."

Brett tilts his head. "They have stuff there we need for your stitches," he says softly. "To keep them clean."

"We aren't going back there," Liam snaps. 

Brett reels for a moment. It's been so long since Liam honest-to-God snapped at him that he's forgotten it could even happen. Now, though, looking at the tense, anxious set of Liam's shoulders, and the slant of his eyebrows, he knows Liam's serious - and that he's scared.

"Okay," he says slowly. "We aren't going back there." He gestures in the direction of their apartment. "Come on. Let's go home." 

Liam falls into step beside him, but he's still holding his crossbow like he's ready to fire, which is a little concerning. Brett wonders briefly if Liam's just a little highly-strung because of everything that's happened recently, but... Liam's always been sort of high-strung, even when things are peaceful. 

"Listen," he says. "We do still need gauze pads, okay? I'll go to the pharmacy while you-"

"I'm coming," Liam says stubbornly.

_You like that he's belligerent and hard-headed_ , Brett reminds himself, trying to be patient. _You like it because it's actually a sign he cares about you, and you know that._

"Alright," he says. "But we've been out for a while. Why don't we go back for a bit, then get them tomorrow?" When he sees Liam hesitate, like he's thinking about it, he jumps at the chance to add, "You can show me on the map which way we're going to get to Oakridge. We should start planning for that now that you're healed."

"Okay," Liam says.

"Alright," Brett says, relieved. "Let's go then." 

He wonders, as they head back, if Liam's having a breakdown or something. But he's been fine right up until now - there have been no other signs that he's mentally crumbling.

And Brett can't believe that now anyway. After everything Liam's been through, Brett desperately needs to believe that he's going to be fine. 

"So," Brett says, once they're back inside. "You wanna show me-"

"We should go as soon as possible," Liam says nervously.

"Huh? I thought we were gonna wait till you were a bit stronger?" Brett asks.

"I just - this isn't right," Liam says. "The amount of Keepers in the area before I got hurt. And now, after, we find out that two have been holed up in a warehouse nearby, and there were zombie Keepers in the hospital when you went to get medicine. Something's wrong, Brett. They've been close this whole time, there's no way they don't know we're around."

Brett nods slowly. "So... what do you think is going on, huh?" he asks. "Why so nervous about the hospital?"

Liam looks flustered. "I don't know what's going on," he says. "Brett, I - I know I sound like I'm fucking crazy, but I just - trust me?"

Brett puts a hand on Liam's shoulder. "I trust you with my life," he murmurs. "You know that."

Liam nods, biting his lip.

"Okay," Brett says. "We get everything we need together and we'll go as soon as we can, okay?"

Liam's still chewing his lip, even as he's beginning to put all his things down and shedding his jacket in favour of a hoodie. "I just don't get... they've been here the whole time. And I never noticed." 

"Could you have missed them?" Brett asks gently.

"Maybe one or two, but that many? I wouldn't miss that many."

Brett nods; Liam's right. And Brett would like to think that even he's observant enough to notice Keepers in their back yard. "Maybe they were hiding," he says. 

Liam looks at him. "Hiding? Why? I mean, they'd know we're on our own..."

"Maybe they're not hiding from us," Brett says quietly. "Maybe they're hiding from someone else."

"Well, I don't wanna meet the people the psychotic cannibals are scared of," Liam says uneasily. "So how about we give it, I dunno, another week, and then we get the fuck out of here?" 

Brett nods. "Alright. Deal. You let me know if anything's up before then, and we'll go sooner."

Liam settles down by the fire with a nod finally looking like he might be relaxing. Brett heads over and sits close to him, smiling a little.

"Can I check your stitches?" he asks. "They probably need to come out pretty soon, or even now."

"Is that gonna hurt as much as putting them in?" Liam asks apprehensively.

Brett smiles. "No. You aren't bleeding to death anymore." He drags the medkit closer. "You wanna take your shirt off?"

"It's all just a ploy to see me strip, isn't it?" Liam asks seriously as he pulls off the hoodie, then the shirt underneath. "You're gonna tell me, nope, they can't come out, and then tomorrow you're going to want to check again."

Brett smiles and leans on his knees for a moment. "I could just take them off for you," he says. "I don't have to get you to do it."

He laughs as a blush starts stealing its way up Liam's chest and neck, eventually reaching his cheeks. "You're never gonna beat me when it comes to flirting, Li," Brett chuckles. "You might not be a girl but you are human." 

"Fuck you," Liam says, but he's smiling.

"Later." Brett moves around to Liam's side. "Straighten up?" 

Liam straightens his torso out and holds still, letting Brett inspect the stitches. They definitely look ready to come out - but Brett's nervous. Not as nervous as he was when Liam eventually came off the antibiotics, but still worried.

"So?" Liam asks.

"I'm gonna try," Brett murmurs. "Just hold still, okay? And tell me if it hurts. It shouldn't." 

"I swear, every one of our conversations ends with you saying, "tell me if..." insert given scenario here," Liam says. "I'm a total bitch about needles and stitches, believe me, you will know if you hurt me."

"You were pretty good when I was putting them in," Brett says. "Once I had to put them in a grown man. Took three people to hold him down so I could do it." He lifts the first stitch and moves it a little. "That okay?"

"Yeah. Feels fine." 

"You sure? I don't want to have to redo them."

"Yeah, it's okay. Feels kinda weird, but it doesn't hurt." Liam looks down. "Am I gonna live?"

"You're gonna live," Brett chuckles as he snips through the first stitch. It comes away easily, not tearing the skin or causing bleeding. "Yeah, there we go," he murmurs. "Coming away nice and easy."

Liam holds still as Brett carefully removes the eight stitches from his side, then inspects the wound. It's completely closed over - the skin is a little red from being poked and prodded, but it looks good, really. 

"You're gonna scar," he murmurs. "But yeah, it's fine." He sits up and smiles. "Good job."

Liam blinks. "I didn't do anything." Then he shrugs. "I don't mind if it scars, anyway."

"Girls dig scars," Brett teases.

"Well, that's hardly a problem," Liam mutters, and Brett laughs.

"Alright. Look, I'm gonna start on a list of stuff we might need to take on the road with us," Brett says. "Reckon you can find us a way out of here?"

Liam nods and smiles.


	14. Chapter Fourteen - Exodus

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I AM BACK. Thanks to everyone who tuned into the last chapter! :D Hopefully you guys enjoy this one too!  
> Also: I don't support underage drinking, lol. Or tequila in general. Shit is nasty.

**Chapter Fourteen - Exodus**

"Brett."

Brett turns around. Liam's bent over the map with his glasses on and a pen in his hand; he looks up when he realises he's got Brett's attention. "I think I found a way out," he says hesitantly.

"Really?" Brett asks excitedly.

"Yeah, but - but it's gonna take a while. Look, I don't know what the deal is with the Keepers, so I don't wanna go too close to what we know is their territory." Liam points at the red line wriggling through the map of the city. "All this is theirs. There are four tunnels on their side and three on ours. The good news is, one of them should be unblocked."

"Okay, so what's the problem?" Brett asks.

"It could take us more than a week to get to it," Liam says. "I've never gone that far before. It wasn't worth it. There are a lot of blockades set up around that area for some reason. I don't even know if it's clear."

Brett chews his lip. "What about these two?" he asks, pointing at the other tunnels.

"Well, this is the one I tried to take you to the first time we met," Liam says, pointing at the closer one. "It had the herd in it, remember?"

"I'll never forget that," Brett says, shivering.

"Mm. And the other is collapsed, mostly, I think. So - so it's up to you. We either wing it with this tunnel, which is about a week away, or we head back out the way you came in and circle back around to find the river."

"Which is faster?" Brett asks.

Liam looks at the map, chewing his lip. "Um... probably... the tunnel, assuming nothing goes wrong."

A week away. Brett looks at Liam; he seems strong and healthy now, but with his injury still playing up and causing muscle spasms at random times - especially when Liam's breathing heavily - and the amount of weight he's dropped from being sick, Brett's not sure a week of trekking out to a tunnel is going to be good for him. 

"Yeah," Liam says softly, and Brett realises he's been staring at Liam's side. "I'm worried about that too."

"Does it hurt?"

"Not right now," Liam says. "But it was pretty bad last night." He looks at the map. "Look, either of these trips are going to be long," he says. "No matter which one you pick. I - I don't know how well I'm gonna hold up, but I'll try not to slow you down, okay?" 

"We'll go at your pace," Brett says, swinging his arm around Liam's shoulders. "I've got no idea where I'm going, remember? So you set the pace and I'll follow along with you."

"I mean outside too." Liam starts gnawing on his fingernails, and Brett pulls his hand away from his mouth. "I mean - I get winded pretty easily now. And I know you think that's just a stamina thing and that it'll fix itself. But outside, I mean, Oakridge is probably far. That's a lot of walking."

"I was actually thinking," Brett says, "that once we got close to an exit, we could try and find a working car. There's heaps left around, and not all of them can have problems. So we'll find a car to do most of the trip in."

"Cars are noisy," Liam says uneasily, even though he looks tempted. "I mean-"

"They're also fast," Brett points out. "We don't have to. But it's an option."

Liam looks at him thoughtfully. Then, "If we found a station wagon, we could put a mattress in the back."

"Now you're talking, Li," Brett grins.

~*~

They end up deciding on the tunnel.

Liam is fairly certain that with a herd in one tunnel, there isn't likely to be one in the other - because zombies, for some odd reason, tend to congregate together. When Brett asks about that, Liam just shrugs his shoulders and says, "Maybe they're too dumb to realise they're not food."

The tunnel is marginally faster than looping back around, anyway, and is in the opposite direction to Keeper territory, so they have even more of a reason to go that way.

Brett carries most of their weapons and ammunition, while Liam is stuck with a lot of the food. They take as many personal belongings as they can - blankets wrapped in bundles and tied to their packs, pillows, a few books for Brett. Liam's got safe points right up until seven miles before the tunnel, and that'll make the trip somewhat easier.

They set out in the morning. By nightfall, they've managed to make it to one of Liam's little hidey-holes - it has a couch, but no bed. Brett watches as Liam shrugs his back off and sits down.

 _He's shaking_ , Brett realises. _We haven't been moving as fast, either._

"You doing okay, Liam?" he asks softly.

Liam looks up and smiles. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm alright. Just kind of cold."

Brett sits down beside him. "Well, I guess we could cuddle naked for warmth," he suggests, and Liam laughs, a little breathlessly.

Half an hour later sees them curled up on the couch together. After some hesitation on Liam's part and some coaxing on Brett's, Liam's come to lie between Brett's legs. Brett's enjoying the warmth of Liam's back against his chest; it's nice to be able to hold someone again. And now he doesn't even have to wonder when this is gonna start to feel weird for Liam.

"You know," he says, "you still seem kind of jumpy. Maybe not jumpy, actually, just... hesitant?"

Liam turns to look at him a little. "Have you ever heard of gay panic?" he asks.

"No?"

"I'm waiting for you to have one and decide that you aren't interested in me after all and then things are going to get super fucking awkward."

Brett smiles at him. "I think if that was gonna happen," he says gently, "it would've happened somewhere in the last month. Most notably when my hand was on your dick."

Liam goes faintly red. "Yeah?"

"Yeah. Why're you all shy and stuff?" Brett chuckles. 

"I'm - not, really," Liam says. "It's just embarrassingly easy to make me blush." He smiles then and turns over. "But... now that I know the gay panic isn't coming anytime soon..."

He doesn't finish his sentence. He's hovering above Brett, leans down to kiss him smoothly as he shuffles closer. 

Brett smiles into it, raises his hands to hold Liam's waist and feels his muscles shifting there. This, he realises, is completely different from being with a girl - Liam is muscular and sharp and hard in all the places girls are usually soft, rough around his face from stubble, and more urgent in how he kisses. Brett's into it. Loves it, even.

He opens his mouth a little, traces Liam's lips with his tongue, and Liam's mouth falls open almost immediately, their tongues touching. The only sound in that moment is their breathing, the shift of their clothes as they get closer, the rasping sound of skin meeting skin.

Liam sighs, moves in closer, using his hands to bracket Brett's head. Brett doesn't remember how he ended up here - safe, fed, with someone soft and warm and trusting in his arms. He doesn't want to think about it too hard, like it's an illusion that could crumble if he isn't careful.

Brett slides his hands up under Liam's shirt, smoothing the pads over his fingers over the raised weal of Liam's scar. Liam goes still, lets him do it, even as he breaks the kiss.

"You said girls dig scars," he murmurs. "Do guys?" 

Brett smiles, thumbing at the end of the scar. "This one does," he says.

"Good," Liam whispers, his mouth tilting a little. 

Brett keeps stroking it. "Does it hurt?" he asks softly.

"No," Liam replies, just as quietly as him. "Not right now." With that, before Brett can say anything else, he's closing the gap between them again - and now he's sitting completely in Brett's lap, his knees on either side of Brett's hips, their pelvises pressed together. 

Brett holds Liam's waist with one hand, his thigh with the other, and pushes his face up into the kiss, trying to gain control of it. Liam lets him pretty quickly - the fight he puts up is half-assed at best and soon, Brett's got entrance to Liam's mouth again. 

Liam rolls his hips down; he's breathing a little harsher than he was before, and he's kind of hard against Brett.

Brett only hesitates for a second before moving the hand that's on Liam's thigh and tucking his fingers into Liam's jeans, pulling him in closer. Liam huffs in surprise, but he goes with it - follows along and moans when Brett cups him through the denim.

"You must be the most responsive person I've ever had sex with," Brett says huskily. As he does, he undoes the button on Liam's jeans, then pulls the zipper down.

"Brett," Liam whispers.

"You want me to stop?"

"No." Liam puts his forehead on Brett's. "Just... go slow."

"Okay," Brett murmurs. "Slow. You got it." He reaches into Liam's jeans and grips him lightly over his boxers. "Any other requests?" 

"No," Liam whispers back. "Just that."

"Okay." Brett spends almost a minute kneading Liam gently through his boxers, and then, slowly - when Liam's undulating his hips and pushing into Brett's hand - he slides his hand inside and grips Liam firmly.

Liam's breath catches, and Brett smiles when he sees the look on Liam's face - his eyes are shut but his mouth is open and red from where he's been biting his lips. When Brett thumbs at the head of his dick, he feels it wet with precome.

"You always like this?" Brett teases.

"Just with you," Liam mumbles back. "I'm close."

"Yeah?" Brett almost wants to ask about Garrett; about how he made Liam feel. But he doesn't, and he won't, because there's never a time and place for that when the guy is dead.  
He tightens his grip and starts stroking; Liam moans - loudly, surprising Brett - and bucks forward. Brett slows down because Liam said he wanted it that way.

He admires the slight sheen, in the half-light, of the head of Liam's dick, and swallows. Getting head from Liam the other day felt so, so good, and Brett's... kind of curious, really, about what it would be like. To give head, that is.

"Can I give you head?" he asks.

Liam's eyes fly open. "Huh?" he croaks.

"Can I give you head?" Brett repeats. "I wanna try it."

"You literally never have to ask if you can give me head," Liam groans. "Sure. Where do you want me?" 

"On your back," Brett says. "Yeah, lean against the arm of the couch." He leans forward and yanks Liam's boxers and jeans down; Liam kicks them off. "That's good."

"You better go really slow," Liam says weakly.

"I will." He can see Liam's almost painfully hard, moves in closer. He nibbles at the taut skin over Liam's hip, then noses his way downwards. It doesn't smell that different from a girl, really. And he's given plenty of head to girls before.

"Put your legs over my shoulders," Brett murmurs. "Can you do something for me?"

Liam's slinging his thighs over Brett's shoulders. "Yeah?" he asks.

"Pull my hair. Not hard. Just..."

Liam winds his fingers into Brett's hair and gives an experimental tug. Brett sighs at the sensation and says, "Yeah. Exactly like that. You've got it."

With that, he bows his head and takes a hesitant lick at Liam. Liam holds still, but Brett can feel his thighs trembling; his legs almost jerk together around Brett's head.

Okay. Liam's probably going to come in under a minute, which, fine. Brett's gonna swallow. He's determined to. Liam did - and there's nowhere convenient to spit, anyway.

He slides his mouth down, slowly, engulfing the head and then the rest. Liam's hands clench before relaxing, and then he starts to pull - small, jerky movements that don't leave the pressure on Brett's head uncomfortable. 

It's not unpleasant. He's getting used to the sensation of Liam's dick in his mouth - this is a first for him - but he's turned on by Liam's thighs trembling a few inches away from his ears and the way Liam's shaking apart beneath him, and how he's breathing, like he's out of breath. 

Brett takes Liam's hips and pulls a little, trying to encourage him to move. Liam lets out a sound - half whimper, half groan - before he moves a little.

"Brett," he whispers.

But Brett wants Liam to come, now, wants to hear it, so he keeps going until he's not sure he can anymore - Liam's nestled at the back of his throat, dangerously close to triggering his gag reflex. He starts putting in a little more work, hollows out his cheeks.

"Brett, I'm gonna come," Liam moans, patting him urgently on the shoulder. "Brett, I - seriously, I'm gonna-"

Brett smiles a little, uses his teeth to brush the head, and then Liam's exploding into a cacophony of noise above him, his hips arching up, his seed pulsing out into Brett's mouth. And Brett winces a little bit, because it's fucking salty, but it isn't that different and he swallows, gripping the backs of Liam's thighs.

When Liam's done and Brett's swallowed everything he has to offer, he pulls away slowly. Liam's starting down at him, red faced and panting.

"That was embarrassingly quick," Liam admits, and Brett laughs a little. "Did it suck?"

"No, I sucked," Brett says pointedly, and Liam smiles. "It was good. I enjoyed it." He settles close. "Did you?"

"Yeah," Liam breathes. "Promise it won't happen that fast next time."

Brett laughs. "Yeah. Whatever you reckon." He starts rubbing Liam's hips. "Sensitive here, huh?"

Liam tilts his head back. "I'm kind of sensitive everywhere," he admits. "Back of my neck, hips, um, my lower back is really bad."

"Lower back?" Brett asks curiously. "Where?" 

"I'm not telling you now," Liam mutters. "I would probably come again if you touched me there right now. It's annoying anyway. I react to everything around those areas."

"Is that why you don't like people touching you?" Brett asks gently.

"No. I don't like people touching me because I'm defensive," Liam says with a self-deprecating smile. "I like you touching me though."

"I can tell," Brett teases. "You want something to eat?"

"Sure. After I put my jeans back on."

Brett tosses them to him as he stands up and heads over to Liam's pack. "Once we settle for a while, we should hunt again," he says. "Running low on deer meat."

Liam shifts against the couch pillows. "I'll bring home the bacon, don't worry. Or, uh, the steak." 

Brett snorts as he tosses Liam a package of the deer meat and rifles around for some water. He wonders briefly if he should get Liam to take some Tylenol, but he doesn't really seem like he's in pain - just kind of tired. He thinks, at this point, that if Liam was in pain, he'd say so.

After a moment's deliberation, Brett grins to himself and sits down on Liam's lap. Liam makes a soft _oof_ and readjusts. "What the fuck?" he groans. "Literally the whole couch and this is where you chose to sit?"

"Maybe I just wanted to be close to you," Brett says, faux offended.

"You just had my dick in your mouth," Liam says. "How much closer can you get?"

Brett slings his arm around Liam's shoulders and smiles. After a moment, despite his best efforts to look irritated, Liam gives in and smiles back. Reluctantly, by the looks of it, which makes Brett snigger.

"Is there water here?" Brett asks. "Maybe we should shower."

"Might be. I'd get up and check but _someone_ decided I'd make a good cushion." Still, Liam isn't genuinely annoyed - his arm has moved to hold Brett's waist, seemingly of its own accord. Brett smiles a little at that.

They sit and eat quietly for a while. Eventually, Brett moves off Liam and checks to see if there's running water. It's cold, and not all that clean, but it's something - and Liam doesn't have to worry about the cleanliness of the water anymore, not now that his wound has healed up.

"Water's working," he calls.

Liam sits up; he'd been lying back on the couch, and Brett has a sneaking suspicion that Liam was probably attempting to sleep, or at the very least, unintentionally drifting off.

"Okay," he says sleepily, heading towards Brett. As he does, he's pulling his shirt over his head and beginning to unbutton his jeans.

"Doesn't have to be a long one," Brett says as he joins Liam in stripping off. "We did a lot of walking today though." He can feel the sweat on his body, and he's sure Liam probably feels the same way. They have soap, somewhere, and Brett decides it might be worth finding. 

When he gets back to the shower with the soap in hand, Liam turns around. "Hey," he says, surprised.

"Save water," Brett says. "Shower together." 

Liam laughs as Brett steps inside. The water is frigid, and they don't spend much time soaping each other up and rinsing off before getting out. 

There are at least towels here. Liam's teeth are chattering as they dry off, and Brett resolves to try and get him warm before they go to sleep, even if that means giving Liam his hoodie as well. 

Liam refuses it, though. They settle down on the couch after brushing their teeth hastily; Liam's eyes are half-closed already when he lies down and shuffles so his back is against Brett's chest.

Brett folds Liam into his arms and sighs quietly. The couch isn't nearly as comfy as their bed, but at least they're not sleeping on the floor.

Liam falls asleep before he does. Brett listens to his breathing even out slowly, feels the steady rise and fall of his chest, and watches as Liam's muscles loosen and go floppy with sleep.

His eyes drift closed. It's been a long day, and they've still got a long way to go.

~*~

Liam's awake when Brett opens his eyes.

And by "awake" Brett means sitting right in front of him, peering at him curiously. His heart almost stops when he sees eyes that close.

"Jesus," he breathes, and Liam smiles.

"Morning."

"The fuck are you doing?"

"Just looking at you."

"That's not creepy at all." Then he sees Liam's holding a mug of tea up for him. "Ah, you're the best," Brett murmurs.

"Thought I was creepy?" But Liam's not genuinely huffy with him. "You snore."

"I know," Brett says sleepily. "And if you were a girl I'd apologise for that. But I feel like you don't actually care that much." He takes a mouthful of the tea and swallows, sighing. "How'd you manage to wriggle away from me?" 

"I had to Houdini my way out. You're like a python or something. Every time you sensed movement you squeezed me tighter." Brett laughs a little at the description, and Liam looks - almost bashful, like he's happy to have made him do that.

Brett remembers that Liam's not used to making people happy and smiles at him, tilting his head on the pillow. Liam seems to have settled in to stay - he's got his calves tucked beneath his thighs and his arms on the edge of the couch.

"We should get out soon," Brett says.

"Yeah. Probably." Liam yawns widely. "I think we're getting close to the tunnel you were meant to leave by."

"Really?"

"Mm. Should keep it down. In case."

They split up to look for supplies that day, anything that might help them survive outside the city that may be hard to come by. Brett's scavenging in a hardware store - with barely an inkling of what may or may not be useful - when Liam finds him.

"Hey," Brett says, holding up some kind of metal contraption. "Do you know what this is?" 

"Car part," Liam answers instantly. "Brett-"

And that's when he notices that Liam looks worried. He straightens up. "What's going on?"

"The tunnel's empty," Liam says.

Brett frowns. "Which tunnel?"

"The one you were meant to leave by. It's empty. I went in to see if there were biters - nothing. Not even a sound. I mean I didn't exactly make loads of noise to check, but-" 

"There are no walkers in the tunnel?" Brett demands. "Are you sure?"

"Positive." 

"That herd, though... that must've been..."

"There were thousands," Liam finishes for him. "But from what I can tell, they're not in the city, or at least not close by."

Brett nods. "Okay then," he says quietly. "So we'll just be careful. See one biter, or a couple, assume there are hundreds more."

"I've always thought like that," Liam says pointedly. "But yeah." 

Liam helps him look around the hardware store for a bit - he can squeeze into a lot of places Brett can't fit - before they leave. Liam's wandering ahead, his crossbow up, when Brett spots it.

It's nothing particularly special - a red station wagon that looks relatively undamaged. The driver's side window is down a crack, but Brett can't see inside for all the dust on it. He wonders if it works, heads towards it - keeping one eye on Liam as he does. He was right - there's nothing obviously wrong with it. Even the tyres look okay.

"Liam," Brett calls.

Liam turns back to him. "Yeah?"

"Do you know anything about cars?" Brett asks. 

"Uh... not really," Liam admits. "I mean I used to watch the Fast and Furious movies a lot."

"Fuck, those were such shit movies," Brett mutters. "Honestly."

"I thought Paul Walker was hot," Liam says, grinning. 

"Of course you did." Brett takes another look at the station wagon. "Look, there doesn't seem to be anything wrong with this car," he says. "I'm wondering if there's a way to get it started. But I don't know much either."

Liam nods. "There's an auto shop near here," he says. "Maybe a quarter of a mile?"

Brett nods. "Okay. I'm gonna see if I can find some keys to this thing. You know how to siphon fuel?"

"Uh..."

Brett smiles at Liam, who looks decidedly sheepish. "That's okay. See if you can find the keys to this thing. I can't squeeze through that gap in the window, but you might be able to. I'll start seeing if the other cars have fuel."

"Don't you need containers for that?" Liam asks.

"Good point. Alright. I'll wait for you, then we'll go to the auto shop. I'll show you how to siphon fuel out of cars."

Liam nods; he's already inspecting the window. "You really think I'm gonna fit through this little gap?" he asks dubiously.

"Think skinny, Liam," Brett encourages.

"I don't know if thinking about it is gonna help much, but okay," Liam says hesitantly, sliding his arm inside. "If I'm lucky, it'll have a windy thing for the window instead of a button."

"A windy thing?" Brett asks, amused.

"Yeah. You know." Liam imitates the movement. "I dunno what they're called, not that it really matters, because this car doesn't have a windy-thing." With that, Liam's slotting his shoulder into the gap, grimacing. "You owe me for this, Brett." 

"You can have the last of the strawberry oatmeal," Brett says.

"That sounds like a good deal." Liam's face lights up suddenly. "I think I found the keys."

"Really? Where?"

"The ignition." Liam's got his tongue between his teeth. "Aah... they're kinda stuck."

"Alright, be gentle," Brett says. "Don't force them or they'll snap off." 

They're standing there for almost a minute with Liam working the keys. Brett keeps an eye out for walkers; there don't seem to be any around, but now, looking into the windows of other cars, he can see that plenty of keys are still in the ignition.

"All these people just... left their cars," he murmurs, disturbed. "Just straight-up left."

"A couple of survivors told me the military came in while people were trying to evacuate and told everyone to clear the area," Liam says. "That the tunnels were blocked. Everyone left on foot after that I guess. No need to take car keys or anything. Yes!"

Liam's finally freed the keys from the ignition; he holds them up triumphantly. "Good job," Brett laughs. "The oatmeal's yours. Now let's get to that auto shop."

Liam presses the button on the car keys; the locks jump in place. "Sweet," he says. "They still work. What about the battery, though?" 

"Good point." Brett opens the door and motions for the keys, putting them in the ignition and turning. The dashboard lights up.

"This is fucking awesome," Liam says gleefully. "How'd it not go flat or die?"

"I guess the engine was completely switched off," Brett says. "And car key batteries last ages. We got lucky." 

"For once," Liam says. He seems to be in good spirits as he leads the way to the auto store. "So, siphoning fuel?"

"Yeah. You've never done it before?" Brett asks. "I figured you would've."

"Brett, I don't drive," Liam says pointedly. "I'd only just gotten my learner's permit when the shit hit the fan. I've been behind the wheel of a car, oh, maybe twice. And that was around the block. Slowly. With my stepdad clutching the dashboard in fear."

Brett laughs. "Okay. I'll teach you to drive."

"You really don't want to do that," Liam says weakly. "I'm serious. I took out three garbage bins and almost hit my neighbour's poodle." 

"So? If it was on the road-"

"It wasn't on the road, Brett, it was on the sidewalk." 

"... So if I ever need someone to cause mass destruction with a car, you're my guy?"

"Yep." 

"Do you really think the tunnel is clear?" Brett asks Liam quietly.

Liam chews his lip. "It looked clear," he says. "When I went through. But I dunno. It... if the tunnel is clear, it means the entire herd moved. And that means they either moved into the city, or they're on the other side."

"Do herds move regularly?" Brett asks.

"Not unless they hear something," Liam says uneasily. "I guess... if something distracted them on the outside..."

"Like what?" Brett asks.

"Maybe... maybe another group?" Liam replies hesitantly. "Maybe they... a big enough group of people passing by, if they had loud cars, maybe..."

 _He doesn't even believe what he's saying_ , Brett realises. He can see that Liam's starting to quietly wig out; he's got insanely well-developed intuition, and if Liam's intuition is telling them something isn't right...

"We should keep going," Brett says. "To the other tunnel. It might take us longer but it sounds like it'll be safer." 

"What about the car?" Liam asks.

"We can drive it as far as we can," Brett says. "It'll at least shorten the time to the next tunnel, right? Or will it be too noisy?" 

Liam bites his lip thoughtfully. "Uh... not around here. I mean I've been out further than this and I haven't seen any walkers for months. But we should drive slowly. Not rev the engine or anything like that."

"Okay," Brett says. "We'll siphon some fuel first, though."

They have to break into the auto shop - which has high windows with fucking bars on them. They're kind of nonplussed for a moment, until Liam says, "So... reckon you could lift me that high?"

"Maybe," Brett says dubiously.

Liam looks around. "What about that?" he asks, pointing at a dumpster. "Could we stand on that while you boosted me to the window? I think I can fit through the bars. Maybe." 

"Gotta try," Brett murmurs.

They start shifting the dumpster. It's a long process; there's only two of them, and even with Liam pressing his full weight against the side, it's barely enough to budge it. Brett doesn't miss the wince of pain on his face, either.

 _He's gonna be out tonight_ , Brett thinks ruefully. _He'll crash as soon as we're safe._

Eventually, they get the dumpster by the window and manage to scramble up. Brett boosts Liam, relieved when Liam manages to slot through the bars inside.

He hears a vague thud on the other side. "Liam?" he calls softly. "You okay?" 

"Yeah," Liam's voice came back. "Didn't look before I walked."

"Sounds like you."

"Fuck you, man."

Brett chuckles as the front door to the place opens, and Liam's standing there, glaring at him huffily. Brett laughs, ruffles his hair, and strides inside.

It doesn't take long to find containers, and it takes even less time to siphon fuel - they've got plenty of choice, after all. They both carry two containers - Brett watches Liam carefully, and even though he seems worn out, he's not necessarily struggling.

Brett wonders, uneasily, if maybe Liam's up and moving around way too quickly after his previous injury. He probably should've let Liam rest more, but with the threat of the Keepers closing in on them and whatever was going on at the hospital... well, Brett's not keen on hanging around.

 _We'll slow down once we get out_ , he promises himself. _There's gotta be a few towns along the road. We can find a house, hole up for a week or so. Catch up on some rest. He needs it. You both do._

When they get back to the station wagon, Brett hefts the fuel containers up onto the back. Liam manages to lift one okay, but stops in his tracks when he tries to lift the other. 

"Fuck," he mutters, and there's definitely a pained whimper being bitten back there. Brett grabs the container and lifts it into the back.

"You okay?" he asks softly.

Liam's touching his side gingerly. "Yeah. I strained it or something. It feels okay now." He looks up at Brett; his eyes are still kind of tight. "Are we going now?"

"Yep."

Brett's relieved to sit in the car and watches as Liam buckles his seatbelt - then crosses his legs awkwardly, crossbow on his lap. Brett shakes his head.

"Do you sit like a little kid everywhere you go?"

"Huh?"

"Never mind." 

They drive slowly. They kind of have to - there are barricades up still, and a few zombie corpses around. Still, it's much better than having to walk, and Liam's breathing a little easier now that he's not struggling along with his pack, crossbow, and fuel containers.

"Hey Brett."

"Yeah?"

"I spy with my little-"

"No," Brett says flatly.

"Oh, come on!" Liam says. "It's tradition."

"I hate that stupid game."

"No, I make it fun. I swear."

"Prove it."

"Well," Liam says, chuckling, "one time we went on a roadtrip, me and my family. And we were driving through countryside and farms and all that shit, and I said, I spy with my little eye, something beginning with S."

"Yeah?" Brett asks. "So? That sounds standard."

"They guessed everything," Liam snickers. "Some stuff I didn't even think about looking out the window. Anyway eventually they gave up, and my mom asked what the answer was."

"And?"

"Steak," Liam says simply. "Because there were cows in the fields."

Brett's jaw drops. "How old were you?"

"Eleven, I think."

"You're a fucking monster," Brett says, and Liam bursts out laughing. "Nah, no way. Fuck that. I'm not playing I spy with you."

Liam looks at him fondly. "I like making you laugh."

Brett actually feels his face warm up at that. "Yeah?"

"Mm." Liam doesn't seem self-conscious about the confession; he's sitting back in his seat and smiling a little to himself.

After that, it's quiet for a while. Liam's looking out the window and Brett's focussing on driving slowly, not letting the car rev, and looking out for zombies that might start paying attention.

"Brett?"

"No I spy."

"No, that's not it," Liam says. "It's just... the road's clear."

Brett looks ahead, suddenly realising that yeah, Liam's right. The road has been completely cleared out, even of corpses, despite the bloodstains that remain on the pavement. 

"Well that's unsettling," Brett mutters. "Are your spidey-senses tingling?"

"No," Liam says. "I wish you'd stop calling it that."

"Why?"

"I hated Spiderman." 

"Fuck, Liam, no one hated Spiderman."

"I did. I saw the one with Toby Maguire in it. What a fucking crybaby." 

"... Get wrecked, Toby Maguire. Apocalypse hermit does not approve of your shitty acting skills."

"I'm not a hermit. I have you." Liam's leaning forward a little. "Seriously, why aren't there any obstacles or anything?" he wonders aloud. "I thought... I mean it's weird enough that there's no tanks or barricades, but moving the bodies?"

"Maybe this area didn't get hit as hard," Brett says.

Liam turns to him. "Even you don't believe that. Everywhere got hit hard. And this close to city exits? There's no way it didn't get hit hard."

"I hate it when you're right," Brett says ruefully. "So what do you think? We keep going?"

Liam leans back. "Yeah. Maybe drive slower. Just in case." He shifts. "Maybe the Keepers had something to do with it," he says softly.

"You see any of their markers?"

"No," Liam says. "But that doesn't mean they aren't around."

"How'd you even know about them, anyway? I mean, you said they kill pretty much everyone they encounter, and that if they knew about you, you'd be dead. So how'd you know they were there if they didn't know about you?"

"They didn't always used to be that way," Liam says. "I guess as resources got harder to find they turned into assholes. I heard about them from people passing through. Got the impression they were kind of, I don't know - military people? Maybe? Or at least run that way. So I stayed clear."

"Military," Brett murmurs. "Reckon they could be working for people?"

"I hope not," Liam mumbles. "I don't wanna meet the people who pay the cannibals." 

"Good point." 

~*~

The trip - which would've taken a week on foot - only ends up taking another day and a half in the car. 

Reaching the tunnel is a relief - partially because they've made it so far without incident, and partially because the tunnel appears to be devoid of life, undead or otherwise.

Still, it's getting dark, so they find somewhere to hole up for the night - a convenience store about half a mile away. They sleep badly; there's no bed here, and it's freezing cold, even when they manage to get the fire going.

They don't even eat in the morning. Liam's up and moving by the time Brett wakes up, his nose red with the cold and his fingernails almost blue, and Brett knows he looks about the same. So they pile into the car and, slowly, begin to drive through the tunnel.

It's silent. Liam's leaning forward in his seat with a torch pointed out the window, because Brett doesn't want to turn the headlights on, looking for any signs that they might need to cut and run.

There are none. The half an hour it takes them to escape through the tunnel is probably the most tense Brett's felt since Liam got stabbed, but eventually, light appears on the other side.

"That was way too easy," Liam breathes, his voice trembling. Brett turns to look at him a little; he's shivering.

"You okay?" Brett asks worriedly. "You're shaking."

"I'm cold," Liam breathes, dragging his sleeves over his hands. "Like, really fucking cold."

"Uh..." Brett stops the car, turns to the backseat, and finds a blanket. "Here. Use this."

Liam takes the blanket gratefully. "Thanks," he says, wrapping it around his shoulders. "How come you're not cold?" he asks as Brett restarts the car and keeps driving.

"I deal with it better, I guess." He doesn't say what he's thinking - that Liam's dropped a lot of his fat reserves over the course of the winter, through bad nutrition and illness, and even though they're coming back, slowly, the lack of natural insulation isn't doing him any favours. 

He sees Liam stifle a yawn and looks at him. "You tired?"

"A little. Long day."

"Why don't you sleep?" Brett suggests. "We're out of the city now anyway. I have the highway signs to follow, so you don't need to navigate me or anything."

"Yeah. I might do that. If that's okay?"

"Sure. Get comfy."

Liam grabs a pillow from the back seat and tucks it behind his back and head before leaning against the passenger door. His hoodie sleeves are still curled over his hands; he smiles sleepily at Brett.

"Kinda nice to have a car."

"Yeah?"

"Mm. Just being out of the wind and stuff is good." Liam shakes his head a little. "That was just... so easy," he murmurs. "No Keepers, road cleared, empty tunnel, we didn't see a single zombie in three days. Just... since when have things actually worked in our favour?"

"Maybe the universe is tired of beating the shit out of us."

Liam yawns. "Maybe."

It goes silent for a bit. Brett stares out the windscreen, watching the trees flash by overhead. It's sunny out, but frigidly cold. The sun rises up, reaching the highest point in the sky, and then, slowly, begins to sink.

"Hey, Li," he says. "I spy?"

No reply. Brett looks sideways at Liam.

Liam's slumped down, back against the passenger side door, head tucked into a pillow. The blanket Brett gave him to keep him warm is wrapped loosely around his shoulders; Liam's well and truly asleep.

Brett smiles a little; Liam's legs are in his lap. He's glad Liam's resting a little, especially after the trouble his side seems to have given him over the last few days. Brett's not honestly surprised; they've been doing a lot of moving around, no resting, and Liam's been carrying half their stuff. 

Brett looks at the fuel tank. There's still more than three quarters left, and they've got maybe another forty gallons of fuel in the back. Liam's going to have plenty of time to rest and recover a little stamina. 

Still. It'd be nice to pull over, maybe sometime in the next two hours, maybe three, and stretch out in the back. It's not the same as being able to set up a fire, but Brett needs to sleep and Liam can't drive, so they're gonna have to make do.

They go over a bump; Liam's eyelids flutter open sleepily. 

"Hey," Brett says.

"Mm, hi," Liam murmurs, tucking his face back into the pillow. "How long was I asleep?"

"Couple of hours," Brett says. "Seemed like you needed it."

Liam nods, still looking sleepy. "Sorry. I didn't mean to check out on you or anything."

Brett shakes his head. "Don't worry about it, Li. You seemed like you were in pain the last few days. I'm glad you slept it off." He glances sideways at Liam, who's watching him with soft, drowsy blue eyes, and smiles. "You're still pretty tired, huh?"

"Yeah," Liam yawns.

"I'm thinking about pulling over soon," Brett says. "So we can both rest. Sound good?"

"Yeah. I'll try to stay awake until then. Keep you company." Liam sits up a little straighter. "Nice being warm, though. Did you turn the heater on?"

"Yeah, for a little while. You were kind of shivering." 

Liam smiles. "I can think of a pretty good way to get warm," he says. 

"And what does that involve, exactly?" Brett asks innocently.

"Well, I don't have enough room to show you up here," Liam grins.

Brett pulls over, making sure the car is behind trees and bushes, and turns the ignition off.

Liam smiles.

~*~

"I love your tattoos," Liam murmurs.

"Yeah?" Brett breathes. Liam's settled in between his legs and is gripping Brett's side, where one of the tattoos is, his mouth tracing the outlines of the mandala. Liam's pretty forward when he wants something, not that Brett minds; he's enjoying the sensation of Liam's full, soft lips etching patterns into his skin.

"I always wanted tattoos," Liam murmurs into his skin. "I guess not now, though."

"We'll find a tattoo artist," Brett whispers. "There's gotta be some left around." He reaches down, hands skimming Liam's shoulders and back. "Come up here," he murmurs. "I wanna touch you back."

Liam smiles and crawls up Brett's body, resting against his chest, and sighs when Brett begins stroking his sides and arms. The car's warm from the heater, and there's a mattress and blankets back here, pillows. Brett can almost pretend that they're just camping, that soon they're gonna be going home.

Liam's hand slides up his arm, and soon his fingers are lacing with Brett's. He's still smiling as he leans down to kiss Brett gently. 

Brett was right about Liam. He's insanely affectionate, but only once you really get to know him, get under the multitudes of defense mechanisms and issues. He's perfectly happy to sit close, be touching all the time, or, as Brett now has evidence of, stop their journey to have sex.

Or what counts as sex, anyway. Brett wants to, at some point in the future, but... he's not sure how it's going to work out. He wants to be on top but he has no idea where Liam lies on that particular scale, even though it would be as simple as asking.

He wraps an arm around Liam's waist, which is smaller than his, and begins to tip them. Liam doesn't resist, so Brett rolls over so that Liam's on his back and Brett's on top. Liam drags a pillow underneath his head and smiles up at Brett.

"This is where you wanted me all along, huh?" 

"You got me there," Brett admits, leaning down. "I wanna try something."

"Okay." Liam sounds mildly confused. "What are you - oh."

Brett smirks a little; he's got the soft bud of Liam's right nipple in his mouth, teasing it with his tongue lightly. Liam breathes out, arches his back. Brett takes the opportunity to snake his arm beneath Liam's waist and hold him there again.

 _I really want to fuck him_ , Brett thinks dizzily, listening to Liam breathe and gasp and writhe beneath him. _Fuck, I really want to-_

It's a confusing concept; Brett had never considered guys as an option before the apocalypse, but now, Liam seems like the only option - and not just because he's the only person Brett's definitely sure is alive. He'd choose Liam over anyone. 

"Brett," Liam moans.

The sound goes straight to his dick; Liam's breathing heavily, and he's hard when Brett reaches down to touch him there. As soon as his hand cups Liam through his jeans, Liam's legs fall apart and he sighs, pushing up a little.

 _Would he stay hard if I did get to fuck him_? Brett wonders. Does he even want that? He closes his eyes, rubbing Liam a little harder and moving on to his left nipple. He can only imagine what Liam would sound like if they did have sex, considering that right now, he's making a substantial amount of noise.

 _He'd be so tight._ Brett groans, pushing his erection against Liam's leg. _He'd feel so fucking good, and I bet he'd sound amazing, too._

He's not exactly sure how to go about it, though. Girls get wet all on their own, but he knows guys don't - so, lube, then. But even then, there must be stretching involved, right? Something to kind of... warm the area up, so to speak. 

He pulls back from Liam's chest to look at him. Liam's flushed, his eyes smouldering at Brett from behind the fan of his eyelashes, his chest pumping steadily as he pants for breath.

"Liam," he says softly.

"Yeah?" Liam breathes. "Why'd you stop? That was amazing." 

"I was just - I was just thinking, I... well, if you... you know, want to, we could..."

Liam stares at him. Brett flounders for another minute, and then, suddenly, Liam seems to understand what he's saying.

"You wanna go further?" he murmurs.

"Yeah," Brett says, relieved.

"Okay." Liam looks eager, excited, as he drags his pack close and unzips one of the pockets. "Here." He puts a tube in Brett's hand. "Golden rule: you can never use too much lube." 

"You're - letting me-"

"I'm not letting you, I really, really want you to," Liam says. "Come on, man. Don't leave me hanging." 

Brett smiles, tugs Liam's jeans and boxers off his hips, and, after a moment, smears some lube onto his ring finger. Liam watches him interestedly, eyes heated. 

"So...?" Brett asks hesitantly.

"So, it's pretty standard," Liam says. "Just go slow, be gentle, I'll tell you if it hurts, etc etc."

"Alright," Brett says. Then, with Liam's hand guiding him down by his wrist, he uses the same finger to trace at Liam's entrance.

Liam shivers straight away, and his cock twitches with interest. Brett grins; he's now got definite proof that Liam's going to enjoy this as much as he is - if not more.

He starts off slow, makes sure to spread the lube around a bit before beginning to push his finger in. Liam wriggles a little bit, lets out a low, drawn out noise, then falls silent. 

Brett closes his eyes. Liam's hot, which was to be expected, really, but also far tighter than anything Brett's experienced before. He hesitates a little, then moves his finger, crooking the tip of it, and slides in further.

He's so surprised by the loud whimper Liam emits that he stops moving; Liam looks up at him. "That wasn't pain," he moans. "Keep going." 

Brett files that away under "list of noises that aren't pain" and continues with his finger. "So, uh, I don't really know what I'm looking for, here," he murmurs.

"You'll know when you find it," Liam breathes. "Trust me. I'll make it pretty obvious." 

"If you say so," Brett says, using his free hand to unzip his jeans. Liam hears the noise and opens his eyes, leans forward a little, and manages to get a fairly good grip on Brett's dick.

Brett sheaths his finger, pulls out, and then pushes it back in, slowly, beginning to move it around a little more as Liam plays almost absently with his dick. Brett swallows; this might be singlehandedly the most erotic thing he's ever done with another person.

He crooks his finger again, changing the angle, and Liam's dick blurts out a stream of precome. "Oh, fuck," Liam moans.

Brett grins triumphantly. "I found it."

"Yeah, you did," Liam moans. "Now hit it again." 

"Can I use another finger?" Brett asks. He wants to see if he can drive Liam mad the same way that works on girls.

"Please," Liam breathes.

So Brett slicks up his index finger and, after a moment's hesitation, drives in slowly. Liam's body is lax and pliant against the sheets - he's relaxed, comfortable, not in pain from what Brett can tell.

Instead of searching for that spot right away, he gets his fingers in up to the knuckles, then starts to widen them slowly, stretching Liam out.

Liam's body snaps to attention, muscles tensing, and the noise that comes out of him is half surprise, half arousal. Brett hesitates.

"Also not pain," Liam gasps. "Please keep doing that."

"This?" Brett scissors his fingers again, then starts settling into a rhythm. He's trying to find the one that everyone has - the one that will have Liam hovering on the edge of his orgasm, but won't allow him to come. 

It doesn't take long to find; after not getting much of a response for a few seconds, and then getting Liam's cock twitching warningly, he's found it - a smooth, steady tempo that has Liam rolling his hips down and stroking Brett's dick in time with his thrusts. 

"Good?" Brett murmurs.

"I thought you'd never done this before," Liam moans.

"I haven't. Not with guys, anyway." Brett shifts closer to make Liam's job easier. "Hey, can you do that thing with your legs?"

"What thing?" Liam pants.

"You put them around my waist," Brett says, feeling a little awkward.

"Huh? Oh." Liam lifts his legs and uses his knees to squeeze Brett's ribs. "This?"

"Yeah," Brett murmurs, closing his eyes. "Yeah, that's awesome." Something about the pressure on his sides, about Liam's bare inner thighs being so close, does wonders for his dick. "How close are you?"

"I'm pretty close," Liam whispers, wriggling a little. He squeezes Brett hard as he does. "This is awesome." 

"Make me come," Brett murmurs, almost not hearing what he's actually saying. "I'll return the favour." 

Liam groans, and he's speeding up, his knees holding Brett tighter and tighter while his passage clenches involuntarily, rhythmically. 

"Liam," Brett groans. "I'm gonna-"

"Yeah, me too, go ahead," Liam croaks brokenly.

Just like that, Brett comes - sort of by accident, really, all over Liam's stomach and chest. As he does, he aims for that spot inside Liam that had him whimpering before and finds it almost instantly, strokes it a few times.

"Fuck," Liam whines, and his hips are jolting upright as a thick stream of come shoots out of him. "Brett-" 

_He came without me laying a hand on his dick_ , Brett thinks, fascinated and kind of shocked. _That's amazing._

Liam finally relaxes underneath him, panting for breath, his eyes closed and his legs slack around Brett's hips. Brett hesitates, then withdraws slowly, carefully. Liam winces anyway.

"Sorry," Brett whispers, rubbing Liam's left hip. 

"S'okay," Liam breathes. "It's normal." 

Brett nods. "I'm gonna clean you up," he murmurs. "Okay?"

"Mhm." 

As he finds a spare cloth and uses some of their unpurified water to start wiping Liam down gently, he reflects that that's probably the most intense orgasm he's ever had. At least, it feels that way. It was insanely different from run of the mill, penis-in-vagina sex, anyway.

He makes sure to wipe the lube off Liam's entrance; he thinks being slippery wouldn't be that comfortable. After that, he cleans himself up and puts his boxers back on before finding Liam's and nudging him a little.

Liam blinks his eyes open. "Hmm?"

"Boxers," Brett says, smiling.

Liam lifts his hips obediently and allows Brett to put them on him, and then - as soon as Brett's lying down, tugging their duvets over them, he's rolling over, slinging one muscled thigh across Brett's middle. He props his face up on one hand, then starts to laugh.

"What?" Brett asks.

"Look at the windows," Liam giggles.

Brett looks - and they're steamed up, covered in condensation.

"Oh my God," he says. "This happened in the Titanic too." 

"No, this did." Liam reaches up and puts his hand against the window, leaving a print there. Brett laughs, and soon Liam's joining in with him. "I told you I knew how to warm it up in here," Liam says with a smile.

"That you did. I'll listen to your ideas more often," Brett teases. He looks down at Liam, who seems a little sleepy. "You okay? I didn't hurt you or anything, right?"

"Nope," Liam says, stretching against him. "Not at all. Which I'm not used to."

Brett frowns. "Not used to?"

"Garrett... didn't always, you know, know what he was doing," Liam says. "I mean we weren't exactly experienced, you know? But sometimes it hurt."

Brett nods. He's beginning to get a picture of Garrett he doesn't particularly like. "Did he... you know, was he good to you?" Brett asks carefully.

There's a long silence. Liam seems to be thinking about what Brett said, judging by his expression. "He could've been better," he says eventually. "He wasn't always... very good about... me, in general."

Brett runs a hand down Liam's back; Liam's rolled so that he's on his stomach, leaning on his elbows. "You?" he asks quietly. "How could anyone not be good about you?"

Liam shrugs, even as his cheeks tint pink. "I dunno, I'm just... I'm kind of quiet. I never tell people how I'm feeling. He spent a lot of time telling me to just say something, but I... I didn't know how, really. I didn't - don't - know how to, you know, let people in, or trust them. And the more he told me to, the worse I got."

Brett nods. He's not sure why that was so hard for Garrett to figure out when Brett had it sussed out within a week of knowing Liam, but maybe it was because they were both so young. "There's nothing wrong with you," Brett says. "Or how you are. Yeah?"

He's surprised when Liam smiles - a real smile, with teeth and everything, unselfconscious, and he realises that's probably something Liam's wanted to hear for a really long time.

"Jesus," Brett says, smiling back at him. "Smile at me like that again and I'll go blind."

Liam laughs a little, ducking his head - Brett sees him blushing anyway. "Um," Liam chuckles. "Yeah."

Brett plays his fingers idly across Liam's shoulders. "Why'd you have lube?" he asks.

"I was... kinda hoping you'd decide to do something like that," Liam says. "I just... you know, Garrett didn't like doing it unless he actually got to get his dick wet."

Brett closes his eyes. "And you didn't argue with him, did you?" 

"No," Liam says quietly. "Should I have?"

"You shouldn't have needed to," Brett points out. "I'm not like that, okay? I thought that was great." 

"Really?" Liam asks skeptically. 

"Yeah. It doesn't have to be traditional sex to feel good. You liked it, right?" When Liam nods, Brett smiles. "Well, I did too. And if you wanna go further at any point, we can, but I don't expect you to, yeah?"

Liam smiles a little. "I want to."

"Okay." Brett keeps his voice even, trying to hide how excited he is by that prospect. "Yeah. Well, we'll talk about it another time, yeah? For now we should get some sleep."

Liam nods, flops down on his back, and sighs - almost contentedly, Brett thinks. And that's pretty nice to hear.

"Night," Liam yawns.

"Night, Li."

~*~

He wakes up because Liam's moving around.

Brett rolls. "Liam?" he asks sleepily.

"Hi," Liam whispers; his hand lands on Brett's side gently. "Sorry. I just needed to pee."

"Sure?" Brett asks.

"Yeah. I'm fine." Liam settles down next to him. "Sorry for waking you up, I was trying to be quiet."

Brett rolls over and nestled up against Liam, only realising after Liam wheezes that he's pretty much crushing him. "Are you sore?" he mumbles. "From earlier?"

"Not really. Sort of tender. But that's normal." Liam moves to lie closer to him. "It was awesome," he whispers into the darkness. "Seriously. I don't think anything's ever felt that good. You - were really gentle." 

Brett smiles at Liam sleepily. "Yeah? I'm glad it was good for you." He starts running his hand absently up and down Liam's side. "'Bout time you got to feel good," he murmurs drowsily. "After everything."

He feels Liam's lips on his forehead, softly. "Go back to sleep," he whispers huskily.

"Yeah. G'night." He holds Liam tighter.

"Night, Brett." 

~*~

Liam's asleep on his chest in the morning.

Brett looks down; he can only see Liam's chaotic bed hair and the soft fan of his eyelashes from here. Brett puts an arm around him.

 _Maybe this can be it_ , he thinks. _Maybe there doesn't have to be any more running or pain or losing people. If we just stayed out here... just us... nobody could hurt him._

He notices Liam's shirtless and looks at the angry red weal of the scar, on his side, from where he was stabbed. It's glinting in the light coming through the windows of the station wagon; Liam's breathing is even, deep, seemingly unhindered by the wound.

Much better than yesterday, Brett muses, running a hand down Liam's arm. He was pretty bad the last few days, all that coughing and wheezing...

Things might change when Liam wakes up. But for now Brett's gonna hope not.

"Liam," he whispers, moving so he can lean up on his side. "Liam, hey."

Liam blinks his eyes open sleepily. "Yeah?" he mumbles. "Morning."

"Morning." Brett smiles a bit; Liam looks so drowsy he can barely keep his eyes open. "I just wanna get up, okay? I'm gonna get a fire going. Start some food."

"Okay," Liam yawns. "Don't go down to the river by yourself, okay? Could be biters."

"I won't," Brett promises. "Put some clothes on before you come outside. It's cold out I think."

"Hmm," Liam replies sleepily.

Brett smiles, backing out of the station wagon as Liam rolls onto his other side. He could ask Liam to get up with him, but he's kind of reluctant to interrupt Liam's sleep, which seems pretty peaceful.

He gets the fire started, which isn't too difficult, everything considered. He can hear the rushing of the river from here, but the area seems to be mostly devoid of wildlife - and walkers, which is a huge bonus.

He gets oatmeal over the fire and then starts stringing up some defenses around the area - bottles, bits of glass and old cans, all on a string, that will alert them to anything or anyone who comes close.

The noise must rouse Liam, because when he's done, Liam's opening the hatch on the station wagon and peering out sleepily. His hair is a chaotic mess, and he still looks drowsy, but he's pulled on his jeans and a hoodie.

"Hey, sleepy," Brett says.

"Hi," Liam yawns. "Oatmeal?"

"You guessed it," Brett says.

Liam looks up. "I can hear the river," he says.

"We're pretty close. I think this highway pretty much follows it." 

Liam leans into the back seat and grabs the map, a pen and his glasses, and lies on his stomach. He slides his glasses on and stares at the map for a long moment; Brett tries not to think about how much he'd like to fuck Liam while he's wearing his glasses.

"Okay," Liam mumbles. "So... I think we're here." He marks the point on the map with his pen. "And uh... I think... we gotta go this way, maybe." 

"You sound so sure," Brett says, smiling.

"Ah, fuck you." Liam squints. "It's not like I even know where Oakridge supposedly is... I mean, I'd never even heard of it before you. I'm guessing." He looks at Brett. "Did your friends ever tell you how to get there?"

"They said turn at the tram tracks in the city," Brett says.

"...Which way?"

"That's the thing. They didn't tell me whether to turn left or right," Brett says ruefully.

"Ah. That'd explain why you looked so lost, then." 

Brett watches Liam skim the map again. "How long were you following me for?" he asks. "When I met you, I mean. How long had you been tracking me?"

"Since you got into the city," Liam says, not looking up.

"What?" Brett demands. "I never even noticed you were there. That was - dude, that was almost the whole day!"

"Well, I wouldn't be a very effective tracker if people knew I was there," Liam says, smiling a little. "I dunno. You didn't seem like much of a threat; I mean, you're a lot bigger than me, but you would've had to get close to use that, and I could tell you didn't have weapons." 

"Do you follow everyone for that long?" Brett asks.

Liam looks up. "Just you," he says.

"Just me?" Brett blinks. "Why?" 

Liam shrugs and looks away again. "I dunno, just... you were alone, and you didn't look that dangerous, or like you were gonna hurt people," Liam mumbles. "And you were talking to yourself."

"What's that got to do with it?"

"Well... I mean..." Liam hedges. "It sort of... doesn't do anything for your badass level, you know?" When Brett tilts his head, he continues. "Look, you were wandering around, no jacket, no weapons or food, talking to yourself. I wasn't scared of you." 

Brett sighs. "Yeah. You knocked me out. I got that."

"Had to check," Liam says, shrugging. "Plus if you had been aggressive I didn't want you to follow me home, or know where you were when you woke up. I was gonna leave the food, though. And the water. I didn't want you to die."

"Did you do that for everyone?" Brett asks softly.

"I tried to." Liam fidgets with the pen, twirling it between his fingers. "Some people are more receptive than others I guess." 

"How do you mean?"

"Some people can have nothing and you try to give them something and their pride won't let 'em take it," Liam says with a shrug. "You weren't like that. Loads of guys are though."

Brett nods. "You wanna go down to the river?" he asks. "Get clean?"

Liam looks around. "Should one of us stay here?" he asks hesitantly. "I mean, I know nobody will probably show up... but what if they do?" 

"Good point," Brett murmurs.

Liam sits up and slides to the edge of the station wagon, pulling on his boots. "I'll check the area near the river," he says. "Make sure it's safe. Then you can go down first if you want."

"You sure?"

Liam smiles and nods, grabbing his crossbow. "Hey," Brett says.

"Yeah?"

Brett points at his own face. "Glasses," he says fondly.

"Oh." Liam takes them off and smiles sheepishly. "Yeah. Right." He hands them to Brett. "Be back soon," he calls over his shoulder.

"Sure," Brett says, feeling sort of uneasy. He knows Liam is fine on his own - in the city, where he knows every nook and cranny, every entrance and exit, every possible escape and dead end. Out here, it's different.

But Liam's back barely five minutes later. "No walkers," he says, almost cheerfully. "Just be careful in the water, okay?" 

"Why?"

"Well, I mean, be careful everywhere," Liam says, blinking. "But there might be walkers in there. Is that a thing? How long do bodies take to sink? Do they sink?"

"They sink initially," Brett says, "unless the person has a lot of fat, because fat is naturally less dense than water. But people like you or I would sink until the water eventually entered our bodies, which would equalize our density compared to the water around us, and we'd float to the surface."

Liam opens his mouth, closes it, and then says, "Okay. So no." 

Brett laughs. "Zombie bodies would probably sink," he says. "Unless they've been in the water for a while. Then they'd float." 

"I'm getting smarter by osmosis, being around you," Liam says. "Um, did I use that word right?"

"Yeah," Brett chuckles, ruffling Liam's hair as he heads down to the water. "You did. Have something to eat."

He's careful not to take long in the river; they should probably make the most of the daylight to keep moving. When he gets back, Liam's halfway through some oatmeal and is staring at the map again, looking mildly confused.

"What's up?" Brett asks. 

"Well it's just - I dunno. I thought Oakridge would be a place, right? Like an actual named place? But there's nothing here."

Brett frowns. "Nothing?"

"Nope." Liam stands. "See if you can find it while I'm down there?" 

"Sure," Brett murmurs, pulling the map towards him as Liam goes down to the water. If he shifts sideways, he can see Liam kicking his shoes off and pulling his shirt off over his head. It's nice to know he's within sight.

He looks back at the map, smiling when he sees that Liam has marked where they are with a red circle and "WE ARE HERE" in block letters. "Make it easier for me, why don't you?" Brett asks himself, beginning to trace their journey.

He fans to the left of where they are, then the right. Judging by the question marks drawn all over the place, Liam's done pretty much the same thing in a clockwise rotation. He soon realises Liam's been focussing on the areas surrounding major cities and towns, then highways and a few smaller, blink-and-you'll-miss-it towns.

But he's right, Brett thinks, beginning to worry. There's nowhere on the map called Oakridge, and nothing that Brett can see that could be misconstrued for it.

He looks up; Liam's washing soap suds off his body. Brett's not sure how effective using soap in a river is, but it's better than nothing.

 _Did I drag him away from his home on some half-assed mission for nothing_? Brett wonders, panicking. _We had a good gig back there. What if I promised him something better and it doesn't even exist?_

"Did you find it?" Liam asks curiously, climbing into the back with him.

"No." Brett swallows. "I can't find it anywhere." 

There's a long pause. Liam looks a little worried, but not angry or accusing, when he says, "Brett... are you... are you sure this is a real place?"

"Yeah." Brett blinks, shakes his head. "No, yeah, I'm sure. Positive. We heard so many people talk about it when they came through, when we met other travellers. It has to be real." He turns to Liam. "And you've never heard of it?"

"Not until you," Liam says. "But I'm not really a good example of being socially well adjusted. I never talked to anyone." 

There's another silence, during which they both stare at the map. 

"Brett, it - it doesn't matter, yeah?" Liam asks eventually. "I mean if it - if it isn't real. Or if we can't find it. We had to leave anyway, the Keepers were getting too close." 

When Brett doesn't answer, Liam tugs on his sleeve. "Brett," he pleads. "C'mon. Look, I probably just read the map wrong. I'll find it."

"What if it doesn't exist?" Brett asks softly.

Liam licks his lips nervously. "I'm sure-"

"Liam, all those people talked about it," Brett says. "Talked, as in, they'd never been there, they were just looking. Not a single person had found it. And we saw a lot of people. Some decided to just stay with us." And, because Liam looks like he's about to speak, Brett says, "Liam, if Oakridge doesn't exist, where the fuck are my friends?"

Liam doesn't answer him properly; instead, he sits up a little more and says, "You said your friends had directions to Oakridge, Brett. Directions, which means it is a real place. So we can't find it on the map. That doesn't mean shit. The map could be ten years old. Even if it was a year out of date - Oakridge could be, like, I dunno, a new community or something-"

"Liam," Brett snaps, and instantly regrets it when Liam draws back, looking surprised before his expression goes carefully and strategically blank.

"I'm sorry," Brett murmurs. "I shouldn't have snapped." 

Liam opens his mouth, then closes it, nods uncertainly. Brett knows Liam well enough to know that he's probably not going to say anything for the next half hour or so - Liam doesn't deal well with raised voices. 

His dad abused him, Brett reminds himself. Liam only mentioned it once, in passing, but he knows that was enough for Liam to be put in hospital with broken ribs.

"What do you think we should do?" Brett prods gently.

Liam chews his lip nervously, looks down at the map. "We," he says quietly, then clears his throat. "Um, we... could just keep following the highway. We should probably stay close to water."

Brett takes a deep breath. He'd rather think about fixing Liam than himself, so he says, "Any successful community will be built near a water source, right?"

Liam looks at him, nods, and smiles.

Brett breathes in, looking back at the map. "Okay. Then we stay near the river, like you said." 

Liam pillows his head on his arms. "Reckon they'll have electricity?" he mumbles hopefully.

"Maybe. Why?"

"I miss toasted sandwiches."

Brett looks at him, sees Liam smiling a little, and realises that Liam's not mad and that he's not going to hold Brett snapping against him.

"Thanks for being here, Liam," he says softly. 

"I wouldn't be anywhere else."

~*~

Their roadtrip has made Brett realise two things.

The first being that he missed driving - genuinely missed being behind the wheel of a car, on an open road, with miles to go before a destination would appear.

The second is that Liam will sleep whenever and wherever he can - mostly in the car, with his legs slung across Brett's lap and his back against the passenger door. Brett thinks it's sort of funny - so far, Liam has dozed off within twenty minutes of getting into the car, without fail, every time.

Brett supposes that after years of living alone, constantly on edge and nervous and ever-vigilant, Liam's overdue for some sleep. So he doesn't try to keep Liam awake, just listens in for any signs that Liam might be having a nightmare - although those seem to have stopped since they left the city. He supposes, out here, the only threat is the zombies - and they're used to those by now.

He sighs. It's only just starting to sink in that the danger, for the most part, seems to have passed - Liam's recovered, mostly, from his injury, and they're away from the Keepers and the threat of winter too.

Not that it isn't cold - it is. Currently, Liam's dozed off in the passenger seat, wearing one of Brett's sweatshirts and wrapped in a thick blanket. 

He's gonna have a sore neck when he wakes up, Brett thinks, staring at the uncomfortable angle Liam's got his head tilted at. Damn. 

He's starting to think they should find somewhere to rest for a while - somewhere more permanent than this. Liam's been sleeping a lot, which Brett is almost positive can be attributed to the fact that he was stabbed less than a month ago. His body is probably still trying to heal the damage done to his side. 

Now that they're out of the city, away from the Keepers, it should be easy enough to find a house along the way to rest in for a bit. And maybe the house will have a bed. And maybe they can have lots of sex before they leave. 

Brett's never really had a relationship quite like this before. His girlfriends were thought of in a purely romantic light; he loved them and took care of them, but at the end of the day, they were love interests. Not necessarily his best friends - and maybe that's what he was doing wrong, because his relationship with Liam has a functional purpose as well - Liam exists to him outside of being Brett's boyfriend. They're relying on each other for survival, not just for orgasms, or laughs.

 _Is he my boyfriend, though_? Brett wonders. _He's wearing my hoodie... but he's been doing that almost since we met_.

He mulls it over for the next hour, until he notices they're running a little low on fuel. Just as he's considering pulling over, he notices a sign - stating that the next town is only a few dozen miles away.

He looks at Liam. A few dozen miles means another half an hour's sleep for Liam, which would give him four, at least. And he seems to be resting easily, for once, so Brett keeps driving. 

The town, as it turns out, is called Blackcliffe, which Brett thinks is utterly depressing - and it seems pretty much devoid of life as they drive in. 

He parks in front of the police station. Even once the engine's switched off, Liam doesn't stir. 

Reluctantly, Brett leans over and puts a hand on Liam's shoulder. He finally shifts, groggily, blinks his eyes open.

"Hey," Brett says. "Sorry I woke you up. We're at a town. I thought we could stop for a few days. Catch up on some rest." 

Liam rubs his eyes. "How long was I asleep?" he mumbles.

"About four hours."

"Four hours?" Liam rasps. His voice is low and husky with sleep. "Why didn't you wake me up?" 

"You probably need the rest," Brett says. "You don't recover from getting stabbed in a month, you know what I mean?" He motions outside. "Place is called Blackcliffe," he says. "Morbid as fuck. But it doesn't seem like there's anyone left here." 

Liam sits up, stretches a little, and rubs at his neck with a wince. "Guess we should check it out then," he yawns. "We're really staying for a while?"

"Figured so, yeah. Get some rest, maybe find some food or something." 

"Okay," Liam says, yawning again. "Gimme an area to cover. Meet back here in an hour?"

"Sure. It's not a big place, so - how about you scope out somewhere to stay? I'll look for food."

Liam narrows his eyes. "You're giving me the easy job again." 

"That's true," Brett agrees lightly. "You wanna know why?"

"Yeah."

"Because you got stabbed, and the more you push yourself, the longer you're going to take to heal," Brett says gently. "You can help, Liam. But I don't - I wouldn't forgive myself if I gave you a job and you got hurt because of it." 

Liam bites his lip, sighs, then leans forward and kisses Brett softly. "Yeah," he murmurs. "I know. Alright, I'll find us somewhere to sleep." 

With that, they split up. Brett makes quick work of the chain supermarket, convenience store, and pharmacy; there isn't a lot left in either. Judging by the proximity of the place to the water, though, and the dense woodland around it, there must be game out here.

When he gets back to the police station, Liam's already there. He's sitting at one of the tables outside, chewing on a protein bar, with his glasses on. In front of him is a map.

"Hey," he says as Brett approaches. "Look. I found a new map."

"What? Why?" Brett asks, sitting down.

"In case our other one was outdated. This was good up to about three years ago." Liam shakes his head. "How much could happen in a year, right? Anyway, I'll keep looking later. What'd you find?"

"Not a lot," Brett admits. "There might be game around here though. Maybe we can hunt. You?"

"Found a nice place," Liam says. "Small, easy to protect. Has a bed, too. Score." 

"Wanna show me this utopia you speak of?" Brett asks.

Liam smiles. "Yeah. Let's go." 

They drive the car; leaving it out in the open is probably a bad idea. It's barely a mile away from the police station; a small place, trees everywhere, the door open. Liam leads the way in.

He's right. It's tiny inside, barely more than a cabin - a combined living and dining area, a master bedroom, a bathroom. The laundry is in the bathroom, the place is so small. 

"This is pretty good," Brett says. "Nice job." 

Liam smiles.

It takes them a while, but they bring everything in from the car. Once they've sat down, and Liam's managed to make one of those nifty little fire-pit things in the middle of the floor, Liam takes out some food and says, "So. Game plan?"

Brett swallows a bite of deer meat. "I reckon we spend a week or so here," he says. "Siphon some more fuel, raid the police station, see if there are supplies there. There's probably a doctor's clinic too. Maybe even hunt some food down. Then I guess we move on." 

"To Oakridge," Liam says simply.

Brett nods silently.

"It exists," Liam says pointedly. "I know it does. How could that many people be so fucking wrong about something?"

"Only takes one person to start a rumour," Brett says. "Everyone else just perpetuates it."

Liam pulls a face at him - his "it's way too early/late for your spiritual crap" face - and stands up. "Reckon they have mugs here?"

"Probably."

Liam reaches up into one of the kitchen cupboards - Brett hears him hiss in pain and wince, sees him lower his arm and use the other. 

_Definitely muscular damage_ , he thinks to himself. _I've gotta look at that._

"Hey," he says. "Come sit down."

Liam retrieves the mugs and sits down next to him. "Yeah?"

"Take your shirt off," Brett says.

"Oh," Liam says, and winks. "You're getting all dominant on me. Nice. I dig it."

"Oh, for fuck's sake," Brett chuckles - and yeah, okay, he's blushing. "Come on. I wanna look at your chest."

Liam winks again, and - half frustrated, half amused - Brett starts pushing at his jacket. Liam laughs and takes it off, then his shirt. "Alright, Dr. Brett. What do you want me to do?"

"I just wanna see how much movement you've got in your arm," Brett murmurs. "And your side, really. I saw you flinch before when you were reaching up." 

"Are you going to give me a proper examination?" Liam asks innocently. 

"Jesus Christ, what the fuck has gotten into you?" Brett laughs. 

"Well, you," Liam says. "A few nights ago. Was kinda hoping that would happen again sometime soon." 

"That can be arranged, if you're a good patient." Brett leans back, shakes his head. "Okay. Let's not take this joke any further." 

Liam shrugs and smiles, lets Brett manipulate his arm and shoulder into different positions. Only a few cause him pain, and Brett realises that Liam's actually got a pretty good range of motion, all things considered - one that will probably be better once he's done healing up. 

"Well," he says, leaning back. "I think you're good."

"Cool."

Brett leans over and grabs his backpack as Liam puts his clothes back on. "Hey," he says. "So, I remembered what you said the other day."

"I hope you don't listen to everything I say; I talk a lot of shit."

"I know," Brett says, grinning when Liam glares at him flatly. "That thing about you not being easy, and wanting a three course meal. So I picked up this today." With that, he produces a bottle of wine and one of tequila.

Liam bursts into a fit of giggles. "Jesus Christ." 

"I'm wining and dining you. Deal with it." Brett pulls out the bottle opener. "And wine should go down easier than vodka."

"What's that, then?" Liam asks, pointing at the tequila. 

Brett sloshes the bottle. "Ah, this. This is the source of every embarrassing and fucked up story I've ever told you."

Liam's face lights up. "Tequila?"

"You aren't gonna be that excited when you try it for the first time." Brett cracks open the wine and pours some into Liam's mug. "Here. Try this."

Liam sniffs it first, pulls away with his nose wrinkled. "Smells gross."

"Yeah, I've never been a fan of wine, but hey, you wanted the full package." 

Liam tips the mug to his mouth and takes a huge gulp of the stuff - Brett bursts out laughing when Liam screws his face up and splutters helplessly.

"Oh God," he groans. "That's so gross." But he holds out his mug for more, so Brett pours some - promising himself that he won't get Liam shitfaced. 

Once Liam's got another half a mug, Brett pours himself some and drinks - this wine isn't that bad, he doesn't think, but Liam's still got cute little wrinkles in his nose, and he's licking his lips like he can't decide if he likes it or not.

"Getting better?" Brett laughs.

"Sort of, yeah." Liam reaches for the deer meat. "Want some?" 

They sit there, eating and drinking, for half an hour - and before Brett notices, most of the bottle of wine is gone. He feels pretty sober, but he looks at Liam and notices the twin patches of colour on his cheeks. He grins.

"You're tipsy, huh?"

"No!" Liam exclaims, like he's offended. "I swear I'm not."

"Sure," Brett teases. "Hey. I promise I'm not trying to get you drunk, but seriously - try some tequila. It's kind of fun."

"How do I do it?" 

"Alright." Brett puts down his mug, which is empty. "So, you take the shot, lick some salt, and then usually bite a lime, but we don't have that so I've just got Mountain Dew."

"Salt?" 

"Yeah." Brett pours the shot, licks the back of his hand, and pours a line of salt on it. "Then Mountain Dew." 

"Okay. Okay. I got this. It's not even that hard." Liam shifts closer; he's warm from the alcohol. "Alright. Shot. Lick. Mountain Dew. Got it." 

"Okay," Brett chuckles. "Here." He hands the mug of tequila to Liam. "All at once or you're gonna spit it everywhere." 

Liam nods, then, after taking a breath, tips the mug to his mouth. He swallows, face screwed up, and turns to Brett with his eyes watering. He licks the back of Brett's hand, where the salt is, when it's offered to him - Brett tries not to think about how good the pad of Liam's tongue rasping across his skin feels - and then takes a swig out of the Mountain Dew can.

"That was horrible," he wheezes.

Brett laughs. "Pussy. Give me your hand."

Liam holds it out, and Brett licks the back, pours some salt on it, and repeats what he had Liam do - and Liam's right; the Mountain Dew doesn't offset the tequila nearly as well as a lime wedge does, or even orange juice. 

When he looks up again, Liam's watching him, his gaze smoky with want. Brett's about to suggest another shot when Liam leans forward and kisses him.

This is different to their other kisses; Liam's being downright needy about this one, his tongue licking into Brett's mouth and bitter with the taste of the alcohol, his hand on the back of Brett's neck.

_Note to self: drink with Liam way more often._

"Come on," he murmurs, breaking the kiss and pulling Liam to his feet. 

"Where're we going?" Liam doesn't sound drunk. That's for sure.

"Bedroom." 

"Fantastic." 

By the time they get there, their shirts are gone and Brett's pushing Liam back onto the mattress, climbing on top of him and beginning to unbuckle his belt. Liam's hard against Brett's hand, already, and Brett feels his own cock twitch desperately.

"Liam," he mumbles. "Are you drunk?"

"No," Liam says, and Brett pulls away to check. But Liam's eyes are clear and he's trying to get Brett to come back. "C'mon, Brett."

"Just checking." And he does, once more, just to make sure - looks down at Liam and hesitates in what he's going.

"Brett," Liam groans, reaching up. "For fuck's sake, I'm not drunk, okay?" And he does sound sober, so Brett leans down and kisses him again.

He's glad they found a place with a bed.

~*~

The sun is filtering in when Brett wakes up.

He's got his arms wrapped tightly around Liam's waist - Liam, who's out cold, breathing deep and slow, his skin hot like the sun against Brett's.

Brett smiles sleepily, nuzzles his nose into the soft hair at the back of Liam's neck. He's going to need to cut it again soon, unless Liam's considering growing it out. 

Slowly, he levers himself away, frees his arms. He spends almost five minutes watching the slope of Liam's waist shift minutely with his breath, marred only by the weal of the scar across his ribs. It's glossy, still pink in the middle, although it's going white around the edges - healing properly. 

_We could stay here_ , he thinks to himself. _This would work._

Except, no, it probably wouldn't. This is a small town, and there's probably not a lot of food here. Their best chance of survival is another city - a group - Oakridge.

 _Should I even take him to Oakridge_? Brett worries. _How's he gonna deal with people after being alone so long? And so many of them have tried to hurt him..._

He's going to have to hope that the loyalty Liam shows Brett is also applicable to other people, once they've earned it.

He hopes Liam isn't hungover. He doesn't think Liam drank enough for that to happen, but it was really his first time doing it.

 _I can't believe I just got my seventeen year old apocalypse hermit boyfriend drunk, and then almost fucked him_ , Brett thinks to himself. _I thought I'd done and seen all the weird shit I was due for in my life._

Because yeah - they didn't fuck. Brett wanted to, so badly, and he's fairly sure that Liam was down for it too, but they didn't, because... well, Brett isn't sure why, but it almost felt too soon and not good enough - not for their first time sleeping together.

Liam stirs, and Brett sits up, watching as he rolls onto his back and blinks his eyes open sleepily.

"Hey," Brett says, keeping his voice pitched low - just in case.

Liam licks his lips. "My mouth tastes bad," he croaks.

"Yeah, tequila will do that." Brett lies on his stomach. "How's your head?"

"Uh... fine." Liam blinks. "For now. Should I be worried?"

"Nah. You're okay. If you don't have a headache now, you're probably safe." 

Liam yawns and sits up. "Mm. What're we doing today?"

Brett smiles. "I'm gonna teach you to drive." 

Liam's getting out of bed. "Hope you've got insurance," he mutters.

Brett laughs.


	15. Chapter Fifteen - Race To Nowhere

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's about time we saw some of Liam's perspective! Trying to get the plot moving here ^_^ Enjoy!

**Chapter Fifteen - Road To Nowhere**

**Liam's P.O.V**

It's light out when he wakes up, and Brett's gone from the bed.

Liam sits up sleepily. He's only wearing his boxers; he's slowly getting used to the feeling of trusting another person enough to see him naked for more than just sex. And Brett, well, Brett seems to think he looks okay, so why not?

He looks around, finds Brett's shirt at the end of the bed, and grabs it, tugging it down over his torso. It smells like Brett - like his natural scent and the cheap soap they've been using.

He swallows.

Things have been going pretty great, really. They've been here two nights, which is good - because everything that's happened has finally started to catch up to them and Liam knows that, at the very least, he feels flat-out exhausted, run down, worn out - he hasn't even wanted to go out scavenging, and when he does, he's slow to move.

Brett hasn't harassed him, though. He's tired too, and he seems to realise that Liam really desperately needs the rest. He's been falling asleep at sundown - usually wherever he happens to be sitting at the time - and only waking up when the sun has well and truly come up. 

And because things have been going great, Liam's been letting his guard down a little. First it was sleeping in his shirt and boxers, but now, most nights, he's taking his shirt off before sleeping - new for him, really. Garrett always pointed out how small he was. He wasn't wrong, but Liam never liked hearing it, and the best way to avoid it was to wear clothes. 

The thing is, now that he's feeling better, he's aching to have Brett close, all the time. And it's freaking him out. He's never wanted to be with someone so bad - to just be around them, even. He doesn't wanna scare Brett off, though. Doesn't want Brett to think he's just some clingy little kid or anything.

Liam sighs, swinging out of bed, and winces a little as his side pulls. The skin has healed, but something still doesn't feel quite right about it - and Brett doesn't know what it is. He hasn't gotten worse, but he really thought, now that he's getting more rest, that it would be improving. 

He wanders out into the living area. The fire's crackling and there's steam rising out of a pot; Brett's making breakfast, which means he probably hasn't been awake that long. He's not wearing a shirt; his tattoos shift in the light, and Liam swallows.

"Morning," he says softly.

Brett jumps. "Hey," he says. "Jesus, you're like a ninja. I didn't even hear you come in."

"That's me." Liam steps over to the fire, sits down next to Brett. Brett smiles.

"Nice shirt."

"You want it back?"

"No. Looks good on you."

Liam plucks at the sleeve pointedly. "I'm drowning in it."

"Looks good on you," Brett repeats firmly. "Hey, you wanna try some more driving today?"

Liam's stomach folds in on itself nervously; Brett laughs, and Liam realises he's let his face contort, instead of keeping it neutral the way he usually would. "Uh," he says. "I mean. Yeah. Sure."

"It gets less stressful the more you do it," Brett reassures him. "Eventually it's all just automatic. And hey, you don't even need to learn about traffic lights or anything like that."

"I don't believe you," Liam says dubiously. "And I still don't understand why you're making me use turn signals. It's not like there's any pedestrians around." 

"There might be some poodles, though," Brett says.

It takes Liam a moment, but when he realises that Brett's referencing his woeful first driving experience, he shoves Brett over and climbs on top of him. For a moment, he doesn't know what he's about to do - and then he sees Brett's exposed ribs and digs his fingers in.

Brett howls with laughter; Liam grins. "Take it back, bitch."

"Fuck you," Brett laughs breathlessly. 

Liam chuckles, but he lets Brett go. He stays sitting astride Brett's hips, watching as Brett gets up onto his elbows and looks at Liam fondly.

"You look good up there."

Liam tries to play that off, smirking even as he blushes a little. "Yeah. That's 'cause I'm top dog."

"Sure." Brett pushes his hips up, and Liam feels the hard line of his dick - and his own, damn him, responds in kind. He shifts a little.

Brett tilts his head. "Breakfast first?" he asks innocently.

Liam blushes. "Yeah."

~*~

They spend that day exploring.

They drive to the police station, which seems to be the middle of the town, and start canvassing the area - together, because the place isn't big enough to need two people to do it.

"So," Brett says. "When should you indicate?"

"Whenever you're turning," Liam says, bored of the driving quizzes already. 

"And when should you stop?"

"When it's not safe to go."

Brett sighs, but he does sound fond when he says, "Little shit," and enters the supermarket.

"Didn't you canvass here before?" Liam asks.

"Not that well. Not well enough, anyway." 

Liam shrugs and nods, taking point with his crossbow. His side feels okay at the moment, but they haven't been out that long. It'll probably start to hurt later.

"Hey, Liam?"

Liam rounds the corner of the store with his crossbow up. "Yeah?"

"Can I ask you something?"

"I ain't stopping you," Liam says. "Shoot." 

"What happened with your dad?" Brett asks softly.

Liam goes quiet for a moment. He's not sure how much detail Brett is looking for, exactly, but, well... he doesn't want to go into it. Not out here. The last time he really thought about what his dad did to him, he had a panic attack.

"He drank a lot," Liam says. "Mom said he had some kind of thing. I dunno what. Never did find out either. Guess that's where I get it from." He doesn't dwell on that thought, steps around a zombie corpse and to a shelf that has stuff on it still. "Used to take it out on us. Her, mostly, but me too when I started fighting back. I didn't like it when he hurt her." 

"When did he drink?" Brett asks.

"When didn't he drink?" Liam responds quietly. "When he was stressed. When he was happy. When he was mad. At first it only happened when he was on the booze, but after a while, that didn't matter. Used to leave bruises where they wouldn't be seen by teachers. A few times they tried to talk to me about it but I was too scared to say anything. First time I told anyone was my stepdad."

"And what happened after that?"

"He went to jail. Some pathetically light sentence for, oh, I forget now what it was. Assault charges or something. Like he didn't try to kick my fucking ribs in or something. Like he wouldn't have killed my mom, eventually, if they hadn't arrested him."

He feels Brett's hand on his neck. "I'm sorry," he murmurs.

Liam shrugs. "Not like it's happening anymore, right? He got bit. First few days." Liam shakes his head. "I barely felt anything," he murmurs. "I mean he was my dad and I just... I watched it happen and I felt almost nothing."

"Doesn't sound like much of a father to me," Brett says.

"He wasn't," Liam agrees. "But he did teach me one very important thing."

"And what's that?"

Liam turns to Brett and smiles a little. "Don't trust anyone," he says, "and don't self-medicate." 

"You trust me," Brett says.

Liam smiles. "You're Brett. That's different." 

He watches as Brett goes a little pink, shrugs, and says, "Yeah. Not that different though. You still had to get to know me, and take a chance on me and stuff. And then wait for-"

Liam leans up and kisses Brett on the mouth, forcefully, and Brett goes quiet. Liam smiles a little into it, sinking back down off his tiptoes when Brett tilts his head forward.

_Note to self: kissing shuts him up._

~*~

They stay in Blackcliffe for a few more nights.

Liam spends most of their third day in the town curled up on the couch, miserable, because the muscles in his side are on fire and he feels like he can't move without it spreading. 

So that's shit. But Brett's nice about it, at least. Brings him water and food and tries to help by putting cold things on it, but it doesn't really help that much. 

He wants to be useful. He spends the first part of the morning trying to pretend he's fine, but by ten he's given that up completely. He can only be grateful that Brett isn't Garrett, and that they can afford to stay put for a while. 

"Out of ten?" Brett asks.

"Six," Liam says tiredly.

"Out of ten" is Brett's new way of asking how much pain Liam's in. And the question, while heartfelt, is getting pretty fucking old, pretty fast. 

"Hmm." Brett peers at him. "You can't have any more Tylenol right now." 

Liam nods unhappily.

Brett tilts his head, watches as Liam shifts a little, and says, "you ever been hurt like this before, Li? You know, badly?"

"Not - not this badly," Liam says. "Never so bad people thought I'd die. But after everything went to shit, I did get attacked by another group. Well we all did. But they went for me 'cause I was small. Anyway, they belted me up pretty bad. Could barely move for a few days - I was pissing blood for about a week."

"Jesus," Brett says, his face a little paler than it was before.

"Yeah. Garrett made me get up and keep moving, though. He was a dick about it. Said it couldn't hurt that badly and that I'd get over it." 

"Prick," Brett says lowly, and Liam adjusts his head. Something in him wants to defend Garrett, even though Brett's right - the other half, on the other hand, is kind of glowing and warm about Brett looking genuinely mad about it.

"It's fine now. No marks." 

"Not on the outside," Brett says.

Liam narrows his eyes. "Way too early for the philosophical crap." 

"It's almost midday."

"Still too early. Hit me up after midnight."

"I'm not hitting you up at all today," Brett says, eyes skimming Liam's body. "I don't think you've moved in three hours."

Liam shrugs. "You're pretty hot," he jokes weakly. "I could move for you." 

"Yeah, but you shouldn't," Brett says gently. "Sleep it off." 

So Liam does. He spends the third day on the couch, resting, the fourth day sorting out supplies, and the fifth day out scavenging with Brett - it's the fifth day they're there that Liam realises he hasn't seen a single zombie.

"Where'd they all go?" he asks uneasily.

Brett shrugs. "They herd together, right? They're probably somewhere else. Hopefully not down the road."

"Hopefully," Liam murmurs.

On the sixth day, they leave.

~*~

If Liam's honest, he's getting tired of all the travelling, never quite setting up camp, never quite recovering from the long car trips - but he knows there's a light at the end of the tunnel somewhere. He just hasn't found it yet.

He drives for almost three hours the day they leave, until he's too sleepy to fight it off and Brett takes over. They drive the whole day, only stop to sleep, and then keep going the next morning.

Liam doesn't know what Brett's looking for, but he's worried. Something's different, strangely so, and Liam doesn't like it. It doesn't feel right. Still, he keeps his mouth shut, and eventually, even Brett tires of driving.

The next town they arrive in is called Warranwood. It, much like the last, looks deserted, although it is bigger. Liam wonders if there might be one or two survivors around, but he doesn't hold out hope as he takes in the destroyed storefronts. 

They orient themselves to the police station again. Again, Brett's job is to scout the area for food, and Liam's is to find them somewhere secure to hole up. He's almost grateful for the time to himself; he enjoys Brett's company when Brett isn't acting weird. 

He's obsessed with Oakridge, Liam thinks as he wanders down a row of houses. Even though it might not be real.

He doesn't want to think about what might happen if Oakridge doesn't exist - if Brett's been chasing the idea of it for months now, only to never have resolution. 

Just as he's crossing the road, he notices a tiny, narrow driveway and stops. The driveway is actually a road, leading to a cul-de-sac; Liam heads down it. Secluded, boxed in, out of the way, check; if nobody else is here, it'll be a good spot.

The end of the cul-de-sac houses five two-story units, all with their windows intact. Liam's nervous as he enters the first - finds that this one has multiple bloodstains in it, and leaves.

The next four are much the same - bloodstains everywhere, even a few bodies in the second, and the stench of something decaying in the third, even though he can't pinpoint the source. He almost gives up on the last one, but it's not like he has anything else to do.

Liam enters the last apartment slowly, his crossbow up. The door was open, which means... well, he's not really sure what that means. Most doors, even now, are locked. Terrified people still have habits, he supposes.

There's a table in the kitchen, strewn with old rubbish. Liam inches around the corner, but he can't see any sign of zombie activity. Not even anything to suggest that zombies have been in this place, which is kind of odd, but also a nice change.

He blinks when he notices a note perched on the table and picks it up. The writing is big, easy to make out, even without his glasses.

_To whoever finds this note - we are not coming back here. Take what you need. Good luck!_

Liam swallows the lump in his throat. Something about the note has left him feeling miserable, and even as he clears the rest of the apartment, he feels wrong about it - like he should back out, despite what the note says.

_It's because people lived here_ , he thinks to himself. _And it reminded you._

He heads upstairs. They creak, but not loudly, and there aren't many of them. He pushes open the door to a bathroom, and then what looks like a study, with a huge Mac computer on the desk. Nothing to see, really, so he shuts the door.

He goes to the next room and opens it.

The colours catch his eye immediately; there's a foam jigsaw mat with letters and numbers on the ground, a mobile, hanging from the ceiling, above a crib. Toys everywhere, books with happy looking bears and dogs on the front. A little pair of shoes on the carpet.

Liam swallows and backs out. 

_They're probably dead_ , he realises as he checks the master bedroom. _How would people with a baby survive?_

_Are there zombie babies?_

Once he's cleared the place, he heads back outside. It's cold out, but the sun is still up, and there's wind whipping down the empty cul-de-sac he's in. There are blood splatters all over the pavement, bodies in some of the cars, but no zombies from what he can see.

He heads back to the car, which isn't parked very far away - maybe half a mile at most. Brett's back already, poring over the map. Liam's stomach twinges; Brett's obsessed with the idea of finding Oakridge. Of it being real. Which Liam is sure that it is... or, at least, was.

_If it was real, it might not even be there by now_ , he reminds himself. _Communities don't last long. You know that._

He's worried about Brett. Really worried. They've been driving and sleeping and occasionally getting each other off - which Liam is not opposed to at all - but he knows, he can tell, that Oakridge is constantly gnawing away at Brett's mind. That if it isn't real... Brett's gonna be devastated. Liam's seen devastation before, the way it destroys people, and he doesn't know if he'll be able to bring Brett back from that if - maybe when - it happens.

Liam wants to find Oakridge - for Brett, mostly. Liam's scared of the very idea of a community, of assimilation, of... routine. He doesn't want any different to what he's currently got; a place to sleep, food, and Brett. The very thought that his freedom might be taken away, that adults might look down at him and shake their heads, not only makes him mad - it makes him scared.

Liam wonders what Brett would do if they found Oakridge, and his friends weren't there, and Liam wanted to leave. Would Brett go with him? Or would he stay anyway? Brett doesn't seem to enjoy being isolated. Not that Liam really does either, it's just that the alternative sounds far worse. 

"I found a place we could sleep," Liam says hesitantly.

"Yeah?" Brett asks, looking up.

"Mm." Liam points. "End of the cul-de-sac. It's uh, it's an apartment or something. No zombies. Seems safe enough." 

"No one's staying there?" 

Liam opens his mouth, then, feeling the lump form in it, closes it and shakes his head. Brett watches him with an oddly assessing expression. 

"Liam?"

"There was a crib," Liam says, and that's all he manages before his throat closes over again. He doesn't know why he's so upset over the idea of a baby; he's never truly thought about it before now. One of the women in his group was pregnant, but she was bitten. 

Brett's face softens. "Yeah. Confronting, huh?"

Liam nods, stays quiet for a little bit, until he's got his voice under control. Then, "There's a master bedroom. We could drag the mattress down the stairs. Sleep in the living room. Seems safer."

"Okay. You wanna lead the way? I'll bring the car down." 

Liam nods and begins down the cul-de-sac. He hears the car rolling, turns around to look at Brett's face through the windscreen.

_Once we get to Oakridge, how much longer are you going to want me?_ Liam wonders.

Brett smiles at him a little, following him to the end of the street. Liam doesn't turn back again; he's felt so fucking weird and strange and off the last few days that he's mostly just wanted to be alone, and scoping out a new place is giving him the chance.

Brett's not even doing anything wrong. That's what's really fucked up - Brett is literally perfect, as far as Liam can tell. He's attentive, generous, caring, recognises when he makes mistakes and apologises for them. He never makes Liam feel stupid or like he's too young or too much or not enough. He's the total antithesis of Garrett. So there's absolutely no reason Liam should be feeling so... inadequate.

_Maybe that's why I'm wigging out_ , Liam thinks miserably as he enters the apartment. _I'm so used to fucked up relationships I can't deal with healthy ones_.

Brett enters behind him. "Nice place," he murmurs. "Seems safe."

Liam gestures to the windows. "Small," he says. "I guess we can board them up if we need to but I don't think we do right now. They aren't even broken... this whole street is almost untouched. Blood in some of the houses, and some bodies, but nothing broken. No signs of struggle."

"You don't think that's weird?" Brett asks, following Liam upstairs. "No struggle?"

"Maybe it didn't get hit hard," Liam murmurs. "It's a small town. Military was mostly in the cities. Maybe everyone died out before there could be any looting." 

"Yeah. Maybe. Guess we'll figure it out once we go into town." Brett helps him pull all the covers off the bed, then lift the mattress. "At least we'll be warm here," he says.

"Yeah." Liam smiles. "You're a pretty good heater."

"You run pretty hot yourself," Brett pants as they start down the stairs with the mattress. "Fuck, this is heavy."

Liam's not even thinking about it; he's just trying not to act weird. "Yeah," he says. "But once it's down there we don't need to move it again or anything."

Once they're at the foot of the stairs, they leave the mattress. Brett begins clearing some space in the middle of the room - he still isn't letting Liam lift anything really heavy - and Liam gets all the things he needs to make a contained fire.

"Where'd you learn to do this?" Brett asks, watching as Liam lights the logs on fire.

"Guy in our group," Liam says. "Same one who taught me how to hunt. Some kind of crazy survivalist type." He stands up. "Wanna move the mattress now?"

"Sure."

They slide it into place, a safe distance from the fire, and begin covering it with the blankets scavenged from upstairs. By the time they're done, it looks pretty cozy, and Liam - suddenly exhausted - flops down on it, curling up on his side with his arm thrown lazily over a pillow. 

Brett dumps his pack and lies beside him, his eyes soft. "Hey."

Liam yawns. "Hi." 

"You think it's safe here?"

"Feels safe. Spidey senses say everything is okay."

Brett laughs a little. "Good. You wanna take a nap before we start bringing things in?"

"Mhm," Liam says drowsily, and then he's out.

~*~

They only nap for a little while - there are things to get done, as per usual, and when Liam wakes, Brett's looking at the map. 

His stomach turns as he sits up. When is Brett not looking at the fucking map? Never. Ever since Liam's been unable to find Oakridge on any map he comes across, Brett's been obsessed with the idea of it existing.

Liam hopes it exists. He doesn't think Brett would survive the crushing disappointment if it doesn't. And Liam doesn't think he'll survive watching Brett go through that. After all, the whole reason he met Brett is because Brett was looking for the fastest route to Oakridge.

"We should bring the stuff in," he says, and Brett jumps. 

"Hey," he says. "Yeah. Alright."

They bring the fuel inside - just in case there are survivors around who want it just as much as them. But Liam hasn't seen anyone other than Brett in almost a year now - not including Trent and that other Keeper. The one he's still trying pretty hard not to think about, like, at all.

He's scared to settle. He thinks about that as they bring things inside; he's scared of slowing to a stop because thinking about survival and food and shelter and Oakridge keeps his mind occupied, and Liam's terrified for the day it won't - for the day that he'll have enough food and be safe and then he'll have to actually think about everything. About Garrett's death, about the massacre of his old group, the unknown fates of his parents and Mason, what happened with the Keeper, being stabbed... and the list is way longer than that. He thinks he'll probably fall apart. 

Liam whittles away at some wood, making stakes, until the sun starts to go down - Brett's nearby, alternating between poring over the map and taking inventory of their supplies. He's good with the numbers and organisation; Liam's not. 

Eventually, Liam feels his eyelids growing heavy; he puts his knife down and stands up. His knees crack - probably not something they should be doing, given that he's seventeen - and he starts to ruffle around for his toothbrush.

After a moment, Brett joins him. They get ready for bed in silence, barely able to see themselves in the small laundry mirror downstairs. Liam pauses before leaving the bathroom; he's getting stubble again, and his hair is getting shaggier. 

When he exits the laundry, Brett's already in their bed, reclining back, watching the doorway. He smiles at Liam - almost encouragingly - as Liam shuffles over and unbuckles his jeans to step out of them. 

"Seems safe here," Brett says.

Liam nods. He's climbing into bed next to Brett - bed, which is just the mattress, on the floor, their pillows, and a pile of blankets. The fire crackles nearby. Liam can even hear birds, faintly, even though the sun is mostly down.

Brett turns on his side; he's not wearing a shirt, and the remaining light throws his tattoos into sharp focus. "You okay?" he asks. "You seem kinda down."

"I'm okay." Something feels different about this; at the other place, there was one bed, one place to sleep, and they did it for warmth. And in the station wagon, the same deal - only one place to sleep. Here? There are options. And they're still getting into bed _together_. 

"You're shy," Brett realises. "How come?"

Liam shrugs. "I'm just weird I guess."

Brett smiles. "I like you like that. Hey, I've already seen you naked. No big deal, right?"

"It's different," Liam mumbles, embarrassed. "I wasn't thinking about it then. But now I am." 

"You shouldn't worry," Brett says softly. "It's just me."

Liam feels oddly soothed by that - like he really needed to be reminded that yeah, it's just Brett, the guy who carried him when he'd been stabbed and stopped him from bleeding out and stayed awake in shifts to ensure Liam got his drugs when he needed them - and, hell, got him into a bath to bring his fever down.

So, with that, Liam pulls his shirt off over his head and joins Brett in lying down. He's a little self conscious - Brett is so much bigger than him, and so much more toned, more tapered around the waist where Liam is almost straight up and down. But Brett smiles and reaches out and palms Liam's chest, gently, and then slides his hand upward, tracing the slope of Liam's collarbones.

Liam feels warm. He's not blushing, though. Maybe it doesn't really matter that he's not as big or as muscular as Brett. Brett doesn't really seem to mind. And he did say a few days ago that he thinks Liam has a great body...

"Not shy anymore?" Brett asks.

Liam shakes his head. 

"Good," Brett murmurs, and then he's shifting in closer, giving Liam a soft kiss on the lips before beginning to make his way downwards, towards his jaw, then his neck. Liam sighs, tilting his head back.

Garrett wasn't ever this attentive to him. Garrett was mostly about getting his dick wet and then moving on. Liam's not used to someone wanting to make him feel good.

Brett's hand closes over his hip; Liam trembles a little at the sensation. He's fucking stoked at just how good it feels to have Brett touching him, wanting to touch him.

He's paying so much attention to Brett's hand that he doesn't notice his mouth travelling down until it latches onto his nipple. He shudders with the sensation, raising his hips a little before forcing himself to settle back down. 

Brett pulls back for a moment. "What do you want to do?" he murmurs softly.

Liam swallows. "Anything," he whispers back. 

"Anything?"

"Yeah."

"Even-" Brett's hand is creeping around to his back, sliding into his boxers. Liam shivers.

"Especially that." He shudders when Brett's hands start rubbing at his lower back. "Brett..."

"Yeah. Let me take care of you." Then Brett's taking Liam's waist and rolling them so that he's on top, crouched over Liam, his lips exploring Liam's neck.

Liam doesn't think before letting his legs fall apart; Brett slides up between them, and he's deliciously warm and heavy against Liam's pelvis and dick. 

"I want you so bad," Liam murmurs, sliding his fingers into Brett's hair. "Brett..."

Brett's moving him again, rolling him onto his stomach, and Liam lets him, shivering when he feels Brett move - away, this time, towards Liam's backpack. Liam knows exactly what he's reaching for, and his dick jumps with excitement.

Then Brett's hands are tugging gently, and Liam's boxers are sliding off his hips and down, until they're completely off. He's naked now, and Brett isn't, which doesn't seem fair at all - not that Liam can see him, exactly. 

He hears the cap pop on the lube and shivers; Brett's hand lands on his ribs.

"Tell me to stop," Brett murmurs. "Anytime. I will."

"I don't want you to stop," Liam whispers back, wishing he could get a hand underneath his body so he could stroke himself. 

"Okay."

The lube is cold where it touches him, but the initial flinch of Liam's body fades into a sigh almost straight away; his nerves are tingling with anticipation, knowing what's going to happen - knowing how Brett can make him feel-

The first finger slips inside, slowly, and Liam breathes out, his cock jerking excitedly underneath him. He pushes forward a little, into the sheets.

Brett groans, his voice vibrating up Liam's spine, his lips against the back of Liam's neck, where he's most sensitive. He's almost as close as it's possible for him to get, with his finger inside Liam, and Liam can feel his weight bearing down on his thighs.

Brett crooks his finger; Liam makes a small sound of encouragement, feeling it brush the tiny bundle of nerves inside him, and Brett targets it again - keeps going with that motion until Liam's unable to stop himself and whimpers loudly.

"Good?" Brett asks huskily.

"Yeah," Liam whispers back.

"Good." With that, there's another finger slipping inside him - Liam gasps at the sensation, revelling in the feeling of being stretched out, of the strange, foreign pressure inside him. Then Brett starts scissoring his fingers and Liam's gone, his fists wrapped in the sheets, body shaking with arousal. He wants to get on his knees, somehow, so he can touch himself, but Brett's pressing him into the mattress and fingering him so deliciously slow Liam doesn't really want to move, even if that means his dick gets ignored. 

He tries to focus on his breathing, but he's finding that hard with Brett's fingers curling and stroking him lovingly, and before he really knows what he's doing, he's struggling up onto his elbows and trying in vain to get to his knees.

Brett stops what he's doing. "Hey," he says. "You okay?"

"Gettin' comfy," Liam breathes. 

"Oh." Brett seems to realise what he wants, then - he uses his free hand to help Liam gently onto his knees. "Better?"

"Mm," Liam moans, finally able to get a hand on his dick. "Yeah."

"Why don't you let me do that?" Brett murmurs, and his hand is pushing Liam's away gently and then grasping his cock.

Liam only half bites back the noise that escapes - Brett's now pumping him slowly, in time with his thrusts, and Liam knows he's not going to last much longer if this keeps going the way it is. 

"Brett," he breathes desperately. "Brett, you - I'm stretched, okay, you can fuck me now, please-"

Brett's fingers withdraw from him slowly. "Where do you wanna be?" he breathes.

"Back," Liam says, and Brett moves, letting him roll over. By the time he has, Brett's boxers are off, and Liam takes in the sight of him - long, hard, with a few beads of precome at the tip. He swallows, licking his lips.

"You sure, Liam?" Brett asks softly. "We can stop if you want."

"I don't want," Liam breathes. "I wanna keep going."

Brett smiles. "Okay." Then he's moving, going to find something in his pack.

Liam leans back against the pillows, swallowing nervously. He wasn't lying to Brett; he does want this. A lot. But it's been a really long time since he last had sex, and it wasn't even that good to begin with. 

When Brett returns with the lube and a condom, Liam's nerves ratchet up again. "Um," he says, reaching for Brett's arm. "Listen, it's been a really long time. So - just be careful? Please?"

Brett looks at him softly. "I'll be careful," he murmurs. "If it hurts, tell me to stop. I promise I will." 

Liam nods, feeling slightly soothed by that promise. He feels stretched, which is good, even though the size of Brett's dick is making him thoroughly fucking nervous. 

"What's up?" Brett asks. 

"Uh - you're - a lot bigger than Garrett was." 

Brett smiles a little. "Garrett was a teenager. I'm not." He lies down flat against Liam's chest and stomach. "Hey, don't worry. I've got plenty of experience with my dick. As long as you don't break up with me while I'm fucking you, we're good." 

Liam laughs, feeling the last of his nerves leave him. He's still smiling when Brett moves off him and kneels in between Liam's legs.

"Are you okay like this?"

"Yeah. I'm good." 

"Tell me to stop if it hurts," Brett says. "I really don't want to hurt you." 

"Yeah. I will."

Some of the nerves return when Brett starts spreading lube on Liam, and then on his dick, and leans closer. His hands are out of view, and Liam can't see what's going on - he can only shake in anticipation as he waits for Brett to slide inside. 

Brett doesn't really give him a warning, which he's glad for. His heart slams uncomfortably against his ribs when he feels the tip at his entrance, and then - with Brett looking down at him carefully - the slow push as Brett starts to enter.

He tries to relax. It's going to suck if he doesn't; it's hard, but he reminds himself that this is Brett, that Brett won't hurt him. Even as Brett begins to push with a little more insistence - uttering a low groan - he wraps a hand around Liam's flagging erection and strokes slowly.

Liam breathes out. Brett's hand is offering him a distraction, but not enough of one; it's starting to burn, and he reaches down, touches Brett's hip.

"Gimme a second," he pleads.

"Okay," Brett whispers. "Tell me when to move."

Liam lies there for a while, trying to grow accustomed to the feeling of Brett inside him. Eventually, the burning fades, and he nods. 

"Sure?"

"Yeah." 

So Brett moves forward again. He's leaning on one hand, using the other to stroke Liam slowly. It's not burning as much anymore; in fact, it's starting to feel pretty good - the pressure, the fullness, the stretch. Liam opens his legs up a little more, gives Brett some space to move, and breathes out a shaky, high-pitched noise.

"Liam?"

"I'm fine," Liam breathes. "It's starting to feel pretty good."

"Yeah?" Brett groans. "It feels pretty good from this end of things." He's sliding in more, and Liam tries to restrain the noise threatening to escape.

He'd forgotten how good it could feel if it was done right. And it's being done right now; the nerves in his passage are exploding with pleasure, and there are shivers rippling down his spine. He hooks his legs around Brett's hips and moves his hips, just a little bit.

He feels it when Brett's buried to the hilt; Brett leans forward, his pelvis against Liam's, their stomachs touching. Brett tucks his face against Liam's neck, his arms wrapped under Liam's shoulders.

"Fuck," he whispers.

"What's wrong?" Liam breathes. He's still sort of adjusting to Brett's width and length inside him, but he really wants Brett to move, and soon. 

"Nothing," Brett pants. "If I move, I'm gonna come." 

"Really?"

"It's been a long time," Brett groans, pushing forward a little. Liam bites back a whimper when the movement strokes his prostate lightly. "And - you feel so fucking good, Liam." 

Liam breathes out; Brett's starting to move, and soon enough, he's not going to be able to keep his fucking mouth shut. He listens to Brett's heavy breathing above him, pays attention to the way Brett holds one of his hips as he straightens up a little bit. The hand slides up to his ribcage, the other gripping the edge of the mattress.

Brett pulls away, then pushes back in, and Liam's breathing hitches dramatically. Brett seems to know it isn't pain causing it, though; he begins to thrust, slowly, letting Liam get accustomed to the sensation.

"Fuck," Liam breathes. Brett's making a series of soft noises in his ear - ranging from grunts to sighs and what sounds like half-formed murmurs of words. "Brett..."

"Yeah?"

"Faster. I'm okay." And when Brett pumps his hips forward, Liam can't help it - a stream of noise spills out of him, and he finds himself going red, trying to stop. 

Brett breathes out against his neck, still gripping Liam's hip as he begins to pick up speed and establish a rhythm. "Fuck," he moans. "Liam, you feel amazing."

Liam wants to say "thanks" but he feels like that's not the response Brett's going for - not that he gets the chance to form a coherent one anyway, because Brett presses forward and nudges his prostate and Liam turns into a whimpering mess. 

"That the spot?"

"That's the spot," Liam confirms, his voice barely more than a whisper. "Yeah. Keep hitting it. Oh, God. _Yes_."

"I'm loving the feedback," Brett chuckles breathlessly. "Is this okay for you? You wanna be somewhere else?"

He hits Liam's prostate; Liam whines helplessly.

"I guess not."

Liam doesn't answer; there are waves of pleasure crashing down his thighs, his lower back, his pelvis. He only remembers it feeling even remotely like this once - when Garrett was slow, gentle, gave him time to work up to it. 

Brett pulls out, almost fully, and then sheaths himself in one fluid movement. Liam shivers and moans and then he lifts his legs up, wrapping them around Brett's hips and using them to draw him in closer.

Brett leans down, beginning to suckle gently on Liam's neck, soothing the marks with his tongue in the aftermath. Soon, he's working his way down Liam's chest.

"Brett," Liam moans weakly; there's heat flooding into the pit of his belly and the muscles in his pelvis and hips and stomach are spasming warningly.

"Yeah?" Brett groans. He's built up a pretty good pace, now, and Liam's jolting with every movement, his back sliding against the sheets, his head shifting on the pillow. He knows his hair probably looks insane; he doesn't care.

Liam gasps when Brett nails his sweet spot, head on, sees stars; his cock twitches. "Careful," Liam pants. "Fuck, I'm gonna come if you-"

He breaks off, closing his eyes, trying to control his breathing and not think about the fact that everything from the waist down has turned to liquid iron, that Brett, hot and wide and swollen inside him, is the best feeling he can ever remember having. And even though he hasn't come yet, he's losing the fight not to - his body is bellowing for it, for release, for satiation. 

"Liam," Brett pants.

Liam opens his eyes; Brett's right above him.

"I want you to come," Brett breathes, wrapping his hands around Liam's cock. "Come on, baby. You can do it."

Liam whimpers once, in surprise, feels his nerve endings explode and fly apart and then he's shooting all over his own chest and stomach and Brett's hand, clenching involuntarily. He sees Brett's eyes close, his mouth drop open.

"Brett," he croaks.

He feels Brett twitch and spasm inside him, yanks Brett into a kiss and swallows the moans and grunts falling from his lips as he shoots into the condom, his hips stuttering for a few seconds before he goes still. 

For a moment, they're both still, trying to catch their breath. Brett's still hard inside him, and while that's great when he's actually turned on and wanting to be fucked, it's not so great when his body is already singing with pleasure and reacting violently to any stimuli it receives.

He shifts; Brett raises up onto his elbows, looking down at Liam, his face red.

"You okay?" he breathes. "Was that good for you?"

"I can't feel my legs," Liam says faintly, and Brett laughs breathlessly. Then - holding Liam's hip gently - he begins to withdraw.

Liam winces a little, but Brett's gentle as he pulls out completely and lets Liam's legs drop. "Want me to clean you up?" he asks softly. 

"Thanks," Liam agrees sleepily. "I don't think I could move right now even if I wanted to."

"That good?"

Liam tilts his head, smiling, watching as Brett finds a cloth and wets it. "That good," he says. "It was pretty great, actually. Was it okay for you?"

"That was the best sex I've ever had," Brett says seriously, and Liam laughs, looks away as he starts to blush. Brett begins cleaning him up - even making sure to get the lube off him, which Liam appreciates.

"Thorough," he comments. "I like it. Don't like being slippery afterwards."

Brett smiles. "Force of habit, really. My ex, she got thrush once because she didn't clean up down there."

"What's thrush?" Liam asks, tilting his head.

"Yeast infection. Uh, basically, it was too wet or whatever down there, and too hot, and so yeast started growing there."

Liam's jaw drops. "Oh my God," he breathes. "That's fucked up."

Brett nods. "Yep."

"Can I get that?"

"You know, I'm not actually sure. I never did."

"Good to know, considering where your dick just was." 

"Ah, I had a condom on," Brett says, pulling his boxers on and helping Liam into his. He lies down right next to him - almost warmer than the heat of the fire. "Seriously, that was..."

"Pretty good," Liam says sleepily. "Is now a bad time to tell you that I pretty much pass out as soon as I come?"

Brett chuckles. "As good a time as any," he says fondly. "Get some sleep, dork."

"Night," Liam murmurs, and he's out.

~*~

Liam wakes up in the middle of the night to Brett's body slung over his.

Liam's on his back, and for the amount of Brett that's pressing down on him, Liam might as well be the mattress itself. He groans uncomfortably; his side is twinging and he's fucking thirsty.

"You're like a fucking furnace," he mumbles to Brett, pushing Brett off him and sitting up. The moonlight is flooding through the lower floor of the apartment; it's relatively easy to see, which is a good thing as he picks his way over Brett's sleeping body and goes to the fire. 

He winces a little when he gets up; he's feeling pretty sore from earlier. He feels kind of weird when he remembers; him and Brett had sex. And it was mind-blowingly good. And Brett was careful, just like he said he would be.

Liam sits down near the fire and picks up a bottle of water sleepily, taking a huge swig before capping it again. The fire's lower than he would usually have it; it's not like they need a lot of warmth. 

He looks at Brett. Brett's shirt is off, the blankets kicked back around his thighs. The patterns of his tattoos are barely discernible in the low light, but Liam feels like he could draw exact replicas if he was given a sheet of paper and a pen. Since they... started whatever this is, Liam thinks he's used his mouth to follow the trail of ink everywhere it leads, and then some.

He swallows, looks down. He's trying not to tap out, trying not to get pissed off or angry or upset. But he doesn't know exactly what he is to Brett, and he doesn't know exactly how much he means with the idea of Oakridge looming on the horizon. The feeling that he might be just a transitionary piece in Brett's life has left him feeling scared and waspish, and he knows he should just, well, ask Brett about it - Brett would give him a straight-up answer, he knows that - he just can't get the words out.

He has to soon. His I.E.D is digging into him like it's got claws and he's an injured rabbit. And he knows that his I.E.D is hugely exacerbated by emotional stress - like what he's going through now. Nothing is the same anymore and he's freaking out. Plus, he's not even back to being fully healthy yet, and the idea that he might have to lean on Brett when Brett might not want him to leaves a sour taste in his mouth.

_What's wrong with you?_ He asks himself gloomily. _You've wanted him for ages and now you have him, so what's the fucking problem?_

He knows what the problem is. The problem is that he wants it to have a label, a name, like that somehow makes the feelings more real... more authentic. And he's worried that Brett's doing this with him because Liam's the only person around. He was straight before all this. And Liam doesn't know where that leaves him when they eventually find a community.

He's so worried Brett's going to forget about him - move on, not bother with him once there are better options around. He's scared of being alone again. 

_I should talk to him about this_ , Liam thinks helplessly. _He told me to at least tell him when something's up. But I don't know how._

So instead of doing that, or contemplating it further, Liam drinks some more water, downs a few Tylenol - just to head off the pain beginning in his side - and creeps back to his side of the bed, slides under the piles of blankets and duvets and puts his head down against the pillow.

His eyes search Brett's sleeping face. He can't find anything to suggest that Brett's dreaming of anything other than bunnies in fields or some shit, though. 

_How does he not have nightmares?_ Liam wonders. _How the fuck does he live through all this? I feel like I'm barely coping most days._

He decides not to think about that either. Instead, he shuffles closer, and, after a moment's hesitation, tucks his head down, against Brett's ribs, and closes his eyes.

_Everything's always better in the morning_ , he reminds himself. _So go to sleep._

He lies awake for hours.

~*~

He's cold when he wakes up in the morning.

He shivers, rolls onto his side, and drags the blankets closer, his right arm searching absently for Brett on the mattress. He's not there; Liam opens his eyes blearily. 

"Hey," Brett says. "Sleepy."

Liam curls the covers closer; he's just realised he's cold because he's not wearing a shirt like he usually would. "Hi," he says sleepily. "How long have you been awake?"

"An hour or so. I was gonna wake you up, but you were awake halfway through the night so I figured you could use the sleep." Then he smiles. "I guess it's a good thing we're alone... I uh... sorry about your neck."

"Huh?" Liam touches his neck. "What about - oh." Patches of his throat and the underside of his jaw are tender; Brett's left marks. "Oh, right," he chuckles. "Yeah, probably a good thing I'm not going home with hickeys."

Brett's still smiling at him. "You want some breakfast?" he asks.

"Yeah." Liam sits up, yawning, and searches for his hoodie. There are a few marks on his chest too, but he ignores them as he pulls on his t-shirt and hoodie and then stands to make his way to the fire.

He's a little tender, but not really that sore anymore. Brett's watching him carefully, probably to make sure he isn't in pain from the night before. Liam tries smiling reassuringly as he sits down next to Brett and pulls a mug of tea towards himself.

"You're okay?" Brett asks. "Not - I didn't hurt you, right?"

"I'm fine," Liam reassures him.

Brett sighs with relief. "Good," he says. "I've been worrying about it all morning." He shuffles a little closer. "That was..."

Liam starts turning red. "Was...?" he prompts nervously.

Brett shakes his head. "It's never been that good before," he says. "With anyone."

Liam rubs his neck. "Garrett said it's tighter there than a girl is," he says softly. "Because-"

"That's not what I'm talking about," Brett says softly. "Look, I know you aren't... that you don't deal well with all the mushy, emotional crap. But I felt close to you last night. Closer than I've ever felt with anyone."

Liam finally gathers the courage to look up into Brett's eyes. "I did too," he says quietly, and he's happy when Brett looks surprised, then pleased. 

_I wanna make him look like that more often_ , Liam realises. But then Brett's turning to that fucking map again and saying, "We should scout today. Find some supplies."

"Yeah," Liam agrees weakly.

~*~

By the time they make it to the grocery store, Liam's brain is fizzing like just-opened wine and he can feel his I.E.D sinking its claws into him.

Not knowing what's going on - being scared - has always made him feel like this - being vulnerable has never failed to bring his I.E.D to the surface. But being this close to an episode around Brett is freaking him out.

Brett's been trying to engage him in conversation, but Liam's having a hard time keeping up or even caring really. So when Brett's voice finally stops, he almost sighs with relief.

"You've been quiet all day," Brett says to him softly.

Liam picks his way through a few broken shelving units, shrugging. "Not much to say I guess." 

"Nah," Brett says, and Liam almost holds his breath before he remembers he's trying to act casual. "That's not you. You're quiet, but not this quiet."

Liam doesn't say anything; his mind is spinning its wheels in the mud, trying to work out how to get out of this conversation. There's white noise in his ears; he doesn't want to lose his temper. He really, really doesn't want to lose his temper, because that means giving Brett a reason to rethink this whole thing they've got going on. 

_You get emotionally attached to every person who throws you a fucking bone_ , Liam thinks miserably. _Why the fuck did you think it would be any different for sex?_

Brett's hand catches his arm gently. "Liam," he murmurs, and Liam turns to face him reluctantly. "Hey," Brett says, smiling kindly. "Are you okay? Are you sick?"

Just like that, the impending outburst withers and dies, leaving a puff of smoke in its wake, and his hearing clears up a little bit. He swallows; nobody's ever been able to talk him down from an attack before. Except Mason, a few times, but that was different, because Mason was his best friend.

"I - I'm not sick." Liam manages a little smile. "I'm okay." 

But Brett's still watching him carefully, like he doesn't believe him. "No," he says. "You aren't. You can tell me to back off if you want, but stop lying to me."

Liam's torn between fear and rage at that; because nobody has ever called him on his bullshit and told him to stop before, not for anything like this, and because, well, who the fuck does Brett think he is to be the first one to do it?

"Fine," Liam says. "Back off."

Brett at least has the good graces to look surprised, like he didn't think Liam would actually take the bait. "Okay," he says uneasily. "But I don't think we should stay out. Not like this." 

"Like what?" But Liam turns around and starts heading back.

"When we're arguing. We can't make good choices with clouded heads."

Liam doesn't answer. He knows Brett's following him out of the store anyway.

"Liam," Brett pleads. "Is this about last night?"

"I thought you said you'd back off if I told you to," Liam says shortly. He'd rather lash out than let Brett see just how insecure he is.

"I changed my mind," Brett says. "Are you - Liam, you are gay, right? You didn't - you didn't think that the only way to keep me around was to-"

Liam snaps.

"I wanted you to!" Liam yells, rounding on Brett, who looks shocked. "Okay? I am gay. I didn't lie about that. And I do want you. But I don't know what's gonna happen when we get to Oakridge and you have other options!"

"Other options?" Brett demands.

"Better options!" Liam shouts. "Options that aren't me!"

"Did you even want to come?" Brett asks. "To Oakridge?"

"I wanted to be with you," Liam says, and he's embarrassed - ashamed - when his voice cracks like a whip. "I didn't care what I had to do to make that happen." 

Something registers in Brett's face, then, because his expression changes and softens and is sympathetic, almost wounded. "You think I'm gonna ditch you for someone else when we get there," he murmurs. "Don't you?" 

"You had a girlfriend before all this." Liam's heart rate is coming down slowly. "You were going to propose to her. I don't - I'm not-"

Not enough. The thought is painful, but it's there, seared into his mind. 

He jolts a little when Brett's arms circle him. "Liam," he murmurs quietly. "Hey. I'm not under any illusions, okay? You aren't a placeholder until the next person comes along. I like you, okay? And not just because you're the only person around. I really like you. I want to be with you, yeah? I want to survive with you." His hand is on the back of Liam's neck. "Is this what's been bothering you?" he asks softly.

"Yeah."

"And you really did want to have sex?"

"I told you, I-"

"You're gay, you didn't lie about that, I know. I believe that, too." Brett pulls away from him, and Liam's surprised to see he looks scared. "Liam, I really need to know I didn't force you into anything," he says, voice shaking. "I really - I wouldn't be able to forgive myself if-" 

"You didn't," Liam whispers. He can't stand the distraught expression on Brett's face, or the tears that are welling up in his eyes. "I really did want to. I wasn't just doing it to keep you around. I didn't even think of that." 

Brett nods a little. He still looks worried, though, really worried. 

"Seriously, I didn't," Liam says. "I'm not that smart, I-" He stops here, because he's somehow succeeded in making Brett smile. "What?"

"Nothing," Brett says, still smiling a little. 

"I'm sorry I blew up," Liam says, feeling frazzled. "I.E.D."

"That was I.E.D?" Brett asks concernedly.

"That was a little baby episode," Liam says. His hands are shaking; he tries to hide it. "I didn't - I'm sorry, it's been eating at me for almost a week now and I didn't know how to say anything. So I didn't. And it got the better of me."

"Was it me?" Brett asks desperately. "Liam, if I'm doing something that's triggering your I.E.D, you need to tell me so I can stop."

Liam blinks. The idea of someone accommodating his mental illness - and he's accepted it as that, now - is, quite frankly, strange and new. Apart from Mason, nobody ever really did - they either pushed his buttons deliberately or left him, and even Mason almost never knew what to do, how to help. 

"I'm just worried about Oakridge," Liam says blankly. "I don't want you to leave me behind." 

Brett's jaw drops. "I'm not gonna leave you behind," he whispers. "You kidding me? I couldn't ever do that."

"Brett, don't pretend - I don't - Oakridge came before I did. You don't have to pretend it's not a priority. I know it is. I just worry whenever I see you looking at that map. It's gonna tear you apart."

Brett stares at him. "Man," he murmurs. "Where's your filter?"

"Gone," Liam says tiredly. "My episodes kind of - I don't know. It's whatever. Also, speaking of which, you don't have to tiptoe around me. I'm the one who's fucked up, not you."

"Hey," Brett says heatedly. "You aren't fucked up. You've got a mental illness; that isn't fucked up. What's fucked up is that you've been taught to view it as some ugly unlovable part of yourself that you should be actively punished for. It's not your fault you have it and it's hardly your fault that you can't access the medication for it anymore. You can't make allowances for me, and you can't help getting angry and lashing out, and I understand that. But I can make allowances for you and I can help retaliating and I can work out and accommodate for anything that might trigger you." 

Liam feels his throat close over and turns away a little, before Brett can see the tears in his eyes.

"Aw, fuck," Brett says. "Liam, I didn't - I didn't mean-"

"I think," Liam says, clearing his throat when his voice cracks, "I think that might be the nicest thing anyone's ever said to me about it. I didn't want you to ever have to say anything about it. But you did and it was probably - probably what I've always wanted to hear, so. Thank you." 

There's a pause, and then he feels Brett's hand on his back. "You wanna head home?" he asks softly. "Maybe we should just chill out today."

Liam swallows and nods, but keeps his head down as they walk - at least until he's sure that he's not going to cry anymore.

"By the way," he says quietly, "Having I.E.D doesn't give me an excuse to be an asshole. Make sure you pull me up on it." 

Brett smiles at him gently. "Sure."

~*~

They spend the rest of that day inside, doing what they can to get organised. Liam manages to snare a couple of rabbits, which he spends most of the rest of the afternoon skinning, gutting, salting and drying out. 

He even cooks some of it - he wouldn't usually, because dried meat lasts way longer - but he can't remember the last time either of them had something that was warm that wasn't oatmeal, and he could honestly do with it right now - he still feels kind of shaky and hazy after his episode before.

At least Brett seems to know something's off, because he's being pretty quiet and staying close by, obviously trying not to startle Liam. Liam appreciates it, wonders what he could do to show that, but comes up short. 

They go to sleep early - Brett curls up around Liam's body and holds him, and Liam, with his restless night's sleep the night before and the lingering exhaustion of an episode weighing him down, passes out almost immediately. 

The next morning is freezing. Liam wakes before Brett, which is strange, and decides to go out - see if he can find them some more rabbits, maybe even a deer or something. They don't usually wander this close to houses, even now, but he might get lucky.

He leaves Brett a note - _bringin' home the bacon_ \- and even includes a stupid cartoon of a deer at the bottom of the page before grabbing his crossbow, putting his boots on, and exiting the apartment quietly.

The sky is dark, clouds looming on the horizon. The sight of them makes Liam nervous; they're nothing like the ones that preceded the snowstorm when Brett was sick, back in Ashburton, but they still look pretty ominous. Liam decides to make it a quick trip.

He's halfway across town, following a set of tracks, when he realises something is wrong. 

There are no birds. And he heard birds, a night or so before, so he knows there usually are - and he knows they're usually active this time of morning. And the grass, nearby, looks like something has walked on it.

He hesitates. Walkers? No. He would've smelled them by now, or seen them. Still, not an animal - deer are already hard to track because they're such cautious animals. They wouldn't leave marks like that. So...

He turns a little - only gets halfway into the movement when something's grabbing him, kicking his knees out from under him, and forcing a rag over his mouth and nose.

Liam chokes; the smell is overpowering, sickly sweet and cloying and Liam tries to hold his breath while he struggles, but whoever it is, they're bigger and stronger than him, and they've got a firm grip on him.

Liam can only hold his breath so long; a minute passes, with both of them struggling, before he's forced to open his mouth and breathe in. The moment he does, the strength fades from his muscles, and his vision goes blurry. 

_Can't pass out. Can't pass out. Can't..._

But coherent thoughts are drifting away from him, and he can barely move. He knows, distantly, that he's been drugged somehow, and that he's in deep, deep shit. 

"Got him?"

"Yeah, but, dude, I don't think this is-" 

"Doesn't matter. Could be working for him or something."

They've put him down, whoever they are, and with the cloth off his face, his head starts to clear almost immediately. He groans a little, tries to sit up.

"Fuck!" the voice says, sounding alarmed.

Then there's an impact on the back of Liam's skull and he blacks out.

~*~

Liam comes to with his head throbbing and a sick, bittersweet taste coating his tongue and the back of his throat. 

_Where am I?_

He's on the pavement, he can tell that much, because it's fucking cold and he's shivering. His hands are bound behind his back, and his ankles are trussed up too.

_Fuck._

"Hey, I think he's waking up."

Liam opens his eyes blearily; the light hurts them. He realises he's probably concussed, like, again. Which is ridiculous. 

Two guys are staring down at him. If he had to guess, he'd say they're around Brett's age, maybe a year older. They both have brown hair and brown eyes, but one is paler than the other. They're peering at him curiously.

"Man," the darker skinned one says uneasily. "He's - I mean, he's pretty young. I don't think-"

"Scotty, we know they use kids, okay? That's been very well established." The pale guy narrows his eyes at Liam. "So, how'd you find us?" he demands.

"What?" Liam croaks confusedly. 

"Oh, pretending not to know the facts to avoid spewing the fact that you know the facts," Pale Guy says. "That's cute. It also won't work on us." 

Liam's head is spinning; he feels sick. "Huh?"

The darker guy looks at his friend, seeming worried. "Dude. How hard did you hit him?"

"I may have used excessive force," Pale Guy says huffily. "But he looked like he was gonna struggle. I mean, did you see his crossbow? He's packing." Pale Guy nudges him, a little forcefully in Liam's opinion. "Hey. What do you want?" he snaps. 

"What do you mean?" Liam rasps. 

Pale Guy sighs and rubs his face slowly, then glares back down at him. "It's a very simple question. So answer it." 

"I don't - I don't know what-"

His stomach rolls, and he just manages to roll onto his side before vomiting. Both the guys jump back, with Pale Guy making a gagging noise himself. 

"Did we really need to chloroform him as well?" the darker guy - Scott, Liam thinks he name was - asks. "Look, he's pretty sick. He's just a kid. Come on, let's get him away from here."

"Just so you know," Pale guy says as they start dragging Liam across the floor, "puking on people is considered very rude in a wide variety of cultures." 

"Fuck you," Liam croaks miserably. He still feels like he could puke again at any moment. 

"Got some bite after all," Pale Guy remarks.

"Stiles," Scott says pointedly. 

Liam keeps quiet. He's starting to get a picture of them both, and if he plays his cards right, he might be able to weasel his way out of this one, hope he hasn't been seriously injured or poisoned, and make his way back to Brett. Brett, who is probably losing his fucking mind right about now. 

Pale Guy - Stiles - is obviously not very warm or comforting. Scott, on the other hand, seems genuinely concerned about Liam's health, and his eyebrows are knitted together as he leans Liam against a wall. He's gentle, too.

Liam's not going to bother appealing to Stiles. It's clear that's not going to help his case at all. Scott, though...

"What now?" Scott asks, seeming distressed.

"Gag him, I guess, so he can stop shooting his mouth off."

Liam freaks; gagging him is a bad idea when he feels this sick, and he knows that the biggest threat to his life if they do is choking on his own vomit. "Don't gag me," he pleads, turning his eyes on Scott. "I'll shut up." 

Scott turns to Stiles, his eyes wide and pleading.

"Ugh, okay, fine," Stiles mutters. "But I'm not promising we won't chloroform the little bastard and throw him in the lake." 

_You need to do something now_ , Liam thinks to himself. _Right now. Make them let you go somehow, or at least distract them until you can get free._

With that, he feigns a whimper, ducking his head and chewing on the inside of his mouth until the pain forces tears to come to his eyes. Scott and Stiles have both gone completely silent, stunned, in front of him.

_Not working. Try again, Liam_. He whimpers again, louder this time, puts a sob behind the action.

"Oh, shit," Stiles says. "Is he, uh, is he crying?" 

"Hey, it's okay," Scott murmurs soothingly. "It's okay, yeah? We're not going to throw you into a lake." From the corner of his vision, Liam sees him throw Stiles a reproachful look. "Look, um, we - we thought you were with someone else. But I guess not. Ah-"

"Please stop crying," Stiles begs. 

_Jesus. These guys aren't tough at all - they're just pretending_ , Liam realises. _They're probably not going to hurt me... not any more than they already have._

"You want some water?" Scott asks helplessly. "We've got water. Here." With that, he's holding a bottle to Liam's mouth - Liam takes a sip, rinses his mouth out, spits, and then finally takes a mouthful. Then he keeps nibbling on the inside of his mouth, biting his tongue for good measure.

"He's still crying," Stiles says. "Why is he still crying? How do we make it stop?" 

"We should let him go!" Scott splutters. "I told you he wasn't the one." 

"Scott, we can't just let him go, he knows where - oh, for fuck's sake, what the hell is-?"

Liam's leaned over and puked again. He can't tell if it's the concussion or whatever they used to drug him with, but whatever it is, it's definitely not agreeing with him. As much as it sucks to be puking right now, though, he has to admit that it's useful for making them feel sorry for him. 

"Well, we need to do something, he's really sick!" Scott protests. "Look at him!" 

"I can see him, okay, he's sort of puking right there in front of me." 

Liam lifts his head just in time to see Brett, moving almost silently towards them. He widens his eyes at Liam, who quickly diverts his attention and starts to pretend to gag - the urge to be sick has passed, but maybe if he can make these two think he's going to choke to death on his own puke, Brett will have the chance to get the drop on them. 

"Oh, fuck, is he dying?" Stiles panics. "How much chloroform did you use on him?" 

"What you told me to! I didn't use enough to kill him," Scott replies, clearly just as panicked as Stiles is.

"Okay, well, this hasn't ever happened before, Scott, so-"

"Can chloroform kill people?" Scott asks weakly. He's trying to get Liam to lean towards them, but Liam can see Brett's shadow from where he is, so he's resisting.

Liam risks a glance up from under his eyelashes; Brett is much closer, now, and he's holding his handgun carefully, ready to strike, so Liam continues his show. 

"We killed him," Stiles says, freaking out. "He's as good as dead. Oh, God, this is not what I meant when I said he would regret messing with us-"

Brett takes the last few steps and presses the gun to Stiles' head. "Back away from him," he says quietly. "Now." 

Stiles freezes. "And if we don't?"

Brett clicks the safety off.

"Alright," Stiles says. "So we're not in a negotiable situation here. Okay. Understood. Backing away now." And they are; they're retreating slowly, and Brett finally comes to stand in front of Liam. He's watching Scott and Stiles warily, but he's put the safety back on - he must've heard them panicking and realising Liam's not actually who they're after.

"So," Brett says slowly. "What kind of two-bit idiots capture the wrong person?" 

"Us," Stiles says. "Apparently."

"Look, we didn't mean to hurt him," Scott says pleadingly. "We really didn't."

"Scare him, maybe," Stiles says. "Shake him up a bit. But we didn't actually wanna kill him, so, you know, you could put the gun down. It's unnecessary." 

Brett turns to look at Liam - there's worry in his eyes. "You okay?"

Liam nods wordlessly. 

"Untie him," Brett orders Scott.

Scott hurries forward and begins untying Liam's wrists. "You reckon you can tell your buddy we really, really didn't mean to hurt you and that we're really, really sorry?" he breathes desperately.

"Nope," Liam croaks.

"Right." 

Once Scott's done untying him, Liam gets to his feet, wobbling coltishly. Brett watches him worriedly. 

"Okay," Brett says. "You tell me everything, I let you go. Understood?"

"Understood," Stiles says sheepishly.

Brett motions at Liam. "What'd you dose him with?"

"Chloroform," Stiles says. 

"Joke's on you guys," Brett says. "Most medication disagrees pretty badly with him. Which is why he was puking. Did you hurt him?" 

"No," Stiles says.

"Uh, actually," Scott says sheepishly, "that's... not true. We kinda hit him with a bat." 

"How hard?"

"He's not bleeding?" Scott offers.

"Doesn't mean he's not brain damaged," Brett grumbles. "What do you guys want, anyway? Why all the fucking James Bond bullshit?" 

"We thought he was someone else," Scott says. "Dude, we really, really wouldn't have hurt him if we'd known. And he's okay now, right? He's fine. Doesn't he look fine, Stiles?"

"He looks great," Stiles agrees.

Brett looks Liam up and down, then back to them. "He looks like shit," he says flatly.

"That's not very nice," Liam says, finally speaking up.

"But he does sound okay," Brett responds dryly. "Alright. You-" He points at Scott. "Tie him up."

"Why?"

"Just do it. I'm the one waving a gun around." 

With that, Scott reluctantly takes the rope used on Liam and binds Stiles' ankles and wrists tightly. Brett hands Liam the gun - Liam aims it at Stiles because he likes Stiles a hell of a lot less than Scott - finds some rope, and ties Scott up too - putting them next to each other, but five feet apart.

"Congratulations," Brett says. "In all my time being an apocalypse survivor, I have never overpowered two people so pathetically easily." 

Stiles winces. "That kinda stings."

"Good." Brett turns to Liam, finally, his eyes soft. He puts a hand on Liam's neck gently. "You okay?" he asks softly. "They didn't hurt you too bad?"

Liam shakes his head. "I'm okay." He glances at them both; they're watching the exchange curiously. "I... can't believe I'm saying this, but I think they do feel genuinely bad," he admits. "They were freaking the fuck out when they thought they'd really hurt me." 

"We do feel bad," Stiles says, like he's physically incapable of restraining himself from speaking. "Really bad. I mean, I don't even like kids, you know? I still would've felt bad if he'd died. Hey, I wasn't gonna throw you in the lake. Scott was right about that."

"I'm not a kid," Liam says flatly. Fuck, he hates being called a kid.

"You are a kid," Stiles argues back. "When you're as old as I am-"

"Stiles, you're twenty two," Scott says quietly.

"When you're as old as I am," Stiles says, louder this time, "everyone is a kid. Especially fifteen year olds."

"I'm seventeen," Liam says. "Not fifteen. Also, fuck you, first of all, for fucking poisoning me. Second of all, at least when I target someone I know they're actually who I'm looking for, dumbass."

"Okay!" Scott says loudly. "Look, can we just - agree that we were looking for someone else, that it was a mistake, and just - go our separate ways?" 

Brett shifts. "If you weren't looking for him," he says, "then who were you looking for?"

Stiles and Scott glance at each other uneasily. 

"What, you're going to fucking drug me and not even tell me why?" Liam demands.

"We were - looking for another guy," Scott says. "We didn't really get a good look at you - just figured you were him. You're a little shorter, now that we've, uh, met you. And his hair is darker. But, yeah. Looking for someone else."

"Why?" Liam asks.

"He's got something of ours," Stiles says. "A few somethings, actually. Or, a few someones."

"Jesus fucking Christ," Liam explodes. "Stop being so fucking cryptic, this isn't a damn Lifetime movie. Either tell us the whole story or stop wasting our fucking time!"

The room goes silent; Brett stares at Liam in surprise. 

"You know," Stiles says, narrowing his eyes, "for a tiny person, you've got awfully big lungs." 

"And you talk a lot of shit for someone who's tied up to a fucking pole with a gun pointed at him," Liam snarls back.

"Okay," Brett says. "You both need to not talk." He turns his attention to Scott. "What happened?" he asks softly. 

"This guy betrayed our group," Scott says. "He was working for a bunch of people in a nearby city. Not sure what it was all about, but he took a bunch of our people - kids too. In the middle of the night. We're part of the scouting team sent to look for them." 

"Part of?" Brett asks.

"Part of," Scott says softly. "The uh, the other part... didn't make it."

Liam kind of softens at that, because Scott and Stiles both look absolutely wrecked by that. "Have you found them?" he asks softly.

"We thought we had," Stiles says. "When we found you. Guess not, though."

"Which city?" Brett asks. "We've been travelling a while. We might be able to point you in the right direction." 

"Ashburton," Stiles says.

Liam goes cold around the same time Brett turns to look at him.

"What?" Stiles asks slowly. "You know where it is?"

"Don't go there," Liam says. "It's fucked up. Seriously - very bad idea to go there. Worst idea you'll have in your life." 

"Why?"

"The paedophilic, slave-trader cannibals have a lot to do with it," Brett says. "There's that. Liam's right, guys. If there's an option, don't go there. We barely got out of there alive."

"You're from there?"

"Why do you think we left?" Liam asks. 

Scott nods. "Well, we're looking for people," he says. "So we kind of have to. Do you... maybe have directions? Could you tell us how to get there?"

"You still wanna go there?" Liam asks dubiously.

"Yeah. We need to get our people back." Scott looks up at him. "Liam, right? That's your name?"

Liam nods uncertainly.

"I'm sorry about the chloroform," Scott says. "We use it because it kind of avoids head injuries. If - I mean, if I'd known you weren't who we were looking for, I wouldn't have done it. But I'm sorry it made you sick." 

"Uh," Liam says blankly, because, really - he's not gonna tell him it's okay because he was fucking jumped while he was minding his own business for once - "Yeah. Okay. But if you wanna avoid head injuries you should get a new partner." He looks pointedly at Stiles.

"Hey, you're a pretty tough kid," Stiles grumbles. "Okay? A tiny crossbow-wielding badass. I panicked when you started to get up." 

Liam narrows his eyes. "Could just say sorry," he points out. "Like Scott did." 

"I think that's all you're gonna get," Brett says to Liam. 

"Hey, man," Scott says, turning his gaze on Brett. "Look, we just wanna - we just wanna find our friends. Honestly. We're not going to come after you if you untie us."

Brett looks at Liam, and Liam realises that Brett's leaving the decision up to him. He takes them both in; they really don't seem like bad guys. A little, well, a little disorganised and definitely not practiced in the art of taking and holding hostages, but not bad guys.

"Okay," he says. "Yeah. I mean - they really... well, I mean, they didn't hurt me after they knew I wasn't who they were looking for," he says hesitantly. "And they were trying to help me." 

Brett shrugs. "Your call." With that, he strides forwards and cuts the ties on their feet and wrists. "Okay. You're free to go. But you should probably remember: Liam's got insanely good intuition and if you follow us, he's gonna know."

"We're not going to follow you," Stiles says. "Believe me. I'll be happy to never see that crossbow again."

"Whatever," Liam says. "Good luck. Don't get munched on."

"Uh - you too," Scott says sheepishly. "Sorry. Again."

Liam waves them off, and, after a tense stare-off, he and Brett take their leave. Liam's just glad to have his crossbow back.

"So," Brett says finally, "did you remember to buy bacon?"

~*~

"Am I gonna live?"

Brett finishes flashing the torch in Liam's eyes, and Liam stops squinting. "Think so. You don't seem too badly concussed." 

"Not too badly," Liam snorts. "Okay. And what about that stuff they used on me?"

"The chloroform?" Brett shakes his head. "No long-term side effects of that. It's usually used to subdue people just for long enough to tie them up. The taste makes people sick, though."

"I tried holding my breath," Liam says. "But as soon as I breathed in I started feeling pretty sleepy."

"It works fast." Brett's tilting his head to look at where Stiles hit him with the bat. "They really didn't hurt you too badly," he murmurs. "I mean, he knocked you, but he didn't hit you nearly as hard as he could have." 

Liam nods. "How long was I gone?"

"Most of the day," Brett says. Liam's sitting on the dining table, and Brett's between his legs, checking for injuries. "I woke up to your note. Got worried after a few hours and went looking for you." 

"How'd you know where I was?" Liam asks. 

Brett turns Liam's arm, revealing a bloody scrape on his elbow. "You left blood on the ground," he says. "And there was an arrow nearby. You must've fired a bolt when Scott grabbed you. Anyway, after that, it was easy - they dragged you through the grass."

"Yeah, I don't think they've had much practice," Liam says. 

Brett stands up properly. "You feel okay now?"

"Yeah. Got a headache, but it's fine." 

Brett finds him some Tylenol, but Liam pushes it away, shaking his head. "It's not that bad," he says. "And we might need it more later."

"Yeah. Okay." Brett helps him off the table; Liam's still feeling a little wobbly, but then, he hasn't eaten all day. He didn't stop for breakfast that morning. "I got your note," he says. "You didn't tell me you were an artist."

Liam laughs a little as he sits by the fire, taking the tea Brett offers him. "Liked that?"

"It was a deer pushing a shopping trolley filled with, uh, what was it?"

"Moose bacon."

"Moose bacon. That's not even a thing." But Brett's smiling. "How could I not have liked it? And I mean, I could even tell that it was a deer pushing a trolley filled with moose bacon. That's not something I could say about everyone's artwork." 

Liam laughs again, a little louder, but it kind of makes his head hurt. He sighs as Brett tugs him in close, lets his head rest against Brett's shoulder and chest. 

"I'll make sure I draw you more cartoons," Liam yawns. "Promise."

"No sleeping," Brett says. "You need to eat first."

"But we don't have any moose bacon." 

He smiles when Brett laughs, snuggles in closer. The day didn't go exactly as planned, but it could've gone a lot worse, and he's grateful for that. 

~*~

Two days later finds Liam in a pretty good mood.

Since they parted with Scott and Stiles, Brett seems to have ditched the map almost entirely, and he's spending all that extra time with Liam. Liam doesn't remember ever touching someone or being touched this much ever. It's a new experience for him and it's great. He's not exactly going to complain that Brett seems to really, really enjoy getting him off. 

The only problem is food. They're running low on meat again, so Liam's out hunting, again, hoping this expedition goes better than the last. They haven't noticed anyone other than Scott and Stiles, so he feels like they're the only other people in town - and he feels like if he runs across them, any exchange is going to be at least amicable. 

He's eager to get this hunting trip over, which is why he's out early again. Hunt, prep the meat, wash it off - and then hopefully crawl back into bed with Brett. And on top of Brett, too, if he gets his way - which he will. Because Brett, like Liam, is male, warm-blooded and, generally speaking, always ready to go. Or at least ready to be ready to go.

Honestly, it's pretty awesome. Probably because he's actually getting laid, but Brett's four years older than him and he's clearly experienced - even if it's not with men, he definitely knows what he's doing with his dick, which, considering Liam's last bed buddy was a sixteen year old, is a huge step up from what Liam's used to.

His dick twitches. "Not now," Liam grumbles at it. It seems to be remembering the night before - Brett had him in that position, again, on his hands and knees with two fingers scissoring him lazily and his free hand jacking Liam in time. Judging by how good it felt with just two fingers, Liam's pretty excited for when Brett actually fucks him like that.

His dick throbs again, and Liam tries to steer his thoughts away - because even though there's no one around to see him pop a boner, it's still kind of embarrassing. He starts making his way towards some of his snares, the more promising ones near the grassland in the park. 

He's in luck; two of the four snares hold rabbits. His stomach turns when he breaks their necks; he hates killing them, he really does, but they have to eat.

Just as he's cutting the string on their feet, a stick snaps close by. Liam drops the rabbits and lunges to his feet, crossbow up, eyes trained forward.

Stiles is standing there, staring at him, looking surprised and a little terrified. Liam loosens up, kneels down, and scoops up the rabbits, then backs up a little bit, watching him warily.

"What?" he asks defensively.

"You just killed those bunnies," Stiles says, sounding offended. 

"Yeah." He holds them up; he does feel bad, sort of, but they have to eat. "Dinner." 

"Oh my God," Stiles says, going white.

"What, you and Scott subsist on grass or somethin'?" 

"No. Scott usually does most of the hunting." Stiles rubs his neck, seeming put off; Liam hasn't taken his eyes off him since he locked them on him, and he knows that it unnerves people - which is the whole point. 

"You look better," Stiles says uneasily.

Liam tilts one shoulder. "No thanks to you."

"Yeah, I'm sorry about the chloroform," Stiles says, sounding honestly regretful. "Uh, really... don't... take it personally."

Liam raises his eyebrows, but he lets it go. Scott, at least, said sorry. Stiles might not have, but Liam's going to assume Scott speaks for them both. 

"You gonna put that down?" Stiles asks, nodding at the crossbow.

"Maybe."

"You gonna hate me forever for whacking you?"

"Maybe." Liam looks around warily. "Where's the other guy? Scott?" he demands. "You guys gonna ambush me with chloroform again?"

"No." Stiles looks... concerned. "Scott's - not here right now."

Liam steps forward curiously. "Where is he?"

"Where's _your_ guy?" Stiles shoots back.

"Around," Liam lies. "Not that it's any of your business." He steps forward again. "Seriously, though - where's Scott? You told us you were gonna clear on outta here to go to Ashburton - which, by the way, is still a terrible idea." 

"We were," Stiles says softly. "There's something wrong with him."

Liam tilts his head. "Something wrong?" he asks. "What?"

"I don't know." Stiles rubs his face. "That's why I'm out alone. I'm looking for something - medicine, or whatever."

Liam shakes his head. "We've been through," he says. "There's nothin' really here. Some places are like that."

"Like what?"

"Empty. Picked clean."

They stand there and stare at each other for a moment. Stiles really does look tired; Liam wonders when Scott got hurt, or sick, or whatever, because he seemed fine a few days ago. Still, they haven't left, so it had to have been recently.

"Look," Stiles says, "I should get back. And I'm really sick of you pointing that thing at me, anyway, so I'm gonna go."

Liam blinks and lowers his crossbow. Stiles looks surprised.

"What's wrong with Scott?" he asks timidly.

"He's sick," Stiles says. "It's pretty bad from what I can tell. I was hoping there'd be medicine or something left, but... like you said, everywhere's been picked clean. So I guess I'm gonna have to find a way to get him out of here and find some meds."

Liam bites his lip anxiously. He knows he and Brett have meds, and that they might be able to help. "Um," he says. "So - so we have some medicine."

"And why would you tell me that?" Stiles asks. "Rubbing it in my face or something?"

"No," Liam says, almost hurt at the sarcasm in Stiles' voice. "I don't - I'm not smart, I don't know if it's what you need. But Brett might. If you - if you tell me where you are, with Scott, I could bring him. We could meet you there."

"Why?" Stiles asks suspiciously.

Liam flounders for a moment. That's a pretty good question, really - why help? He's asking himself the same thing. But Scott and Stiles seem like genuinely good people, and Liam can't help but think that maybe Scott means to Stiles what Brett means to him. 

"It's the right thing to do?" he asks.

Stiles rolls his eyes. "Oh, God."

"Hey, you don't want help, fine," Liam snaps. "That's on you, though, if he gets worse."

"What would Brett be able to do anyway?"

"I got stabbed once," Liam offers up. "And I'm still here. Even though I got really sick afterwards. I probably - no, I definitely would've died if Brett hadn't been there." 

Stiles looks torn.

"I'll leave the crossbow," Liam says hesitantly. 

"Okay, alright, fine," Stiles says, shakily. "Look, we're at the same place as last time, okay? That's where we are."

"See you soon," Liam says, heading back towards the apartment.

Brett's there when he gets back. "Hey," he says, standing up. "You were gone longer than usual. What happened?"

"I saw Stiles," Liam says. "Hey, uh, do you make house calls?"


	16. Chapter Sixteen - Hazard Pay

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one's from Liam's point of view again! Thanks to everyone who's reading this, Threads and Decibels - it means a lot! :D

**Chapter Sixteen - Hazard Pay**

**Liam's P.O.V**

Liam enters the warehouse with his crossbow up, just in case.

"This isn't a hostile situation, you know," Brett says behind him. "I doubt you need to point that thing at anyone."

"Better safe than sorry." 

Brett shakes his head. "If he's actually sick," he says, "he's not gonna get better in here. This is barely shelter."

Liam nods in agreement. It is pretty cold out. And this place has a pretty awful draft. He kind of wishes they were safely ensconced in their little apartment, but he doubts that'll happen for a while. Sadly.

"What're we gonna do if he needs someplace better to stay?" Liam asks.

"That's up to you, Li."

"Why's it always up to me?" Liam grumbles.

"Because you're much better at reading people than I am."

Stiles and Scott come into view as they round the corner; Scott is lying down, and Stiles is nearby. Liam puts his crossbow away reluctantly.

"Hey," he says, mostly to announce their arrival.

Stiles turns. "I didn't think you'd actually come back," he says, moving aside a little when they approach - Liam first, because he doesn't want anything to happen to Brett. Even if that means something happening to him.

"I don't make promises I can't keep," Liam says. 

Brett holds out a hand, and Liam blinks.

"Stay back," he murmurs. "I don't want you to get exposed to it. I got sick last winter; you didn't. If either of us is gonna catch something, it'll be you." 

Liam shuffles a little, but ultimately, he does what he's told; Brett doesn't know how to hunt properly yet and someone needs to keep bringing food in. They're barely breaking even with the rabbits. "Okay," he says reluctantly. "I'll keep watch I guess." 

He stands at the door of the warehouse, peering out into the gloom, as Brett and Stiles talk quietly over Scott's form. He doesn't turn around; he doesn't need to see or hear what's going on. 

As he's scanning the horizon, he notices a deer, not too far away, near their car. He stands attention straight away; that deer could mean a fuckload of food. 

"Brett," he says, quietly.

Brett turns. "Yeah?"

"Found a deer. I'm gonna go get it." 

Brett looks like he wants to tell Liam no, but he doesn't stop him. "Just be careful," he says. "Okay?"

"Always." With that, Liam starts moving forward slowly, trying not to make any noise. The deer have good hearing, and they're incredibly skittish, hard to pin down, and even harder to chase if they're spooked. 

But Liam's small, and his centre of gravity is close to the ground, and he can hide way more easily behind things than someone Brett's height can, and that's always worked to his advantage. 

He needs this kill. And that's what has him being extra careful, eventually stopping a mere twenty feet from the thing. It doesn't even look at him.

He raises his crossbow, and - apologising to it briefly in his head - fires. The bolt hits it clean in the skull, and it goes toppling over, dead instantly. Liam's at least glad they don't have to suffer. 

He hurries forward, grabs its hind legs, and starts dragging it across the ground, back towards the warehouse. He's surprised to see Brett and Stiles carrying Scott between them.

"What's going on?" he asks.

"He needs to be indoors," Brett pants. "Nice job, Li."

"What? Oh. Yeah. So we're taking him back to ours?" Liam asks.

"If that's okay with you," Brett says. "Otherwise we'll just-"

"It's okay with me," Liam says, hurrying to keep up - his kill still dragging behind him. "What's wrong with him?"

"Pneumonia," Brett says. "I think. I don't have the drugs here but we do back at the apartment. You okay with that?" He's motioning to the deer.

"It's not a big one," Liam says, suddenly becoming aware that Stiles is staring at him. "Uh... yeah?" 

"Nothing. Tarzan."

"Tarzan?" Liam blinks, but takes the chance to heft the deer into the boot of the station wagon. It's not a heavy one, maybe not as big as he'd like, but it's still going to feed them for a long time. 

"Liam," Brett calls.

Liam heads around to him. "Yeah?"

"Can you drive?" he asks.

"Uh," Liam stammers.

"He drives?" Stiles asks, looking somewhat doubtful. 

"He's okay," Brett says. "He's learning. But I need you to be in the back with Scott - help me keep him steady."

"I - okay," Liam says nervously, getting into the driver's seat. "Sorry if it's kind of jerky back there."

He starts the car once everyone's in, takes a deep breath, and begins driving - slowly. Scott's coughing fitfully in the back, but Liam's not willing to go much faster - so far his experience is limited to a few hours around their last town and three hours driving in a straight line on the highway. 

"You're doing a great job, Li," Brett says.

"Thanks," Liam says nervously, but Brett's praise does put him a little more at ease. Which he's sure factors into him getting them all home safely. 

He hovers uselessly as Brett and Stiles get Scott out of the car. "What should I do?" he asks helplessly.

Brett seems to have only just remembered Liam's there. "Uh - you have the deer, right? And those rabbits inside. They need to be prepped." 

"Okay." He feels pretty useless, but he goes about the gruesome work of prepping the meat - starting with the rabbits, because they've been dead longer and take less time. He gets lost in the work, up to his elbows in blood and skin and grit, for hours, until the meat is all sliced up and ready to be salted and dried.

He washes his hands thoroughly before he goes back inside. Scott's on the mattress, with Stiles and Brett nearby. Liam tries to creep around to the fire - tries to go unnoticed - with the meat, but they both turn to him.

"Sorry," he whispers, ducking his head.

"What for?" Brett wonders aloud. "It's okay. How'd it go?"

"We've got enough food," Liam says, still not sure of his place in the situation. "Uh, for all of us."

Stiles looks up at them both.

"As if we're gonna bring you here and then not feed you and eat in front of you," Liam mumbles. "Just lucky I caught the deer is all." 

Brett smiles at him. "You wanna come here?" he asks.

Liam puts the meat near the fire and heads over, sinking down onto his knees beside Brett. "I thought you didn't want me around him?" he mumbles.

Brett shakes his head. "If you're gonna catch it, you're gonna catch it. Stiles hasn't, though." He looks at the fire. "Jesus. That's a lot of meat."

"Yeah. Gotta salt it before we sleep, though. Otherwise it'll go bad." 

That's when he notices Stiles watching them, his eyes slightly narrowed, his gaze flicking between them. Brett's hand is on Liam's thigh. 

"So, what's this?" Stiles asks, gesturing between Brett and Liam.

"What's what?" Liam asks.

"Whatever's going on between you two. We thought you were brothers at first - but you're not, are you?" Stiles asks. "Not even close. Did you even know each other before the outbreak?"

"No," Liam snaps. "Not that it's any of your fucking business."

"Liam," Brett says. "Hey. It's fine." He looks at Stiles. "You're worried, huh?" he asks. "That I'm abusing him or something. Is that it?"

"He said he's seventeen," Stiles says. "And you're way older than that."

"Look, it - it's not like that," Liam says. He's desperate to clear Brett's name, just so that Stiles will stop looking at him with such disgust on their faces. "Okay? He's - yeah. We're - more than friends. But it's not like that. He's not molesting me or anything. I'm here because I wanna be."

Stiles nods slowly. "Okay," he says. "Sorry. But you never know." He looks down at Scott. "How's he doing?"

"Not that great," Brett admits. "But he should improve now that he's indoors and on medicine for it." 

Liam shuffles where he's sitting. Brett seems to notice it's because he wants to say something, because he turns.

"Yeah?" he asks kindly.

"We should put him closer to the fire," Liam says nervously. "It's really cold tonight." 

It is really cold out; almost like it's going to snow. Liam feels pretty nervous about that; they're with new people they barely know, one of whom is pretty sick, sharing an apartment in a town none of them know very well. Weather affects people in weird ways; Liam knows this. He sort of likes Stiles and Scott and he doesn't want them to be bad guys.

"Yeah," Brett says. "Good idea."

It doesn't take them long to move Scott onto the couch, much closer to the fire, but he is heavy, and by the time they're done, Liam's old wound is twinging warningly. 

Brett seems to know he's uncomfortable almost intuitively. "We should sleep," he says. "All of us. Been a long day."

Stiles nods, taking up a spot in the armchair. Brett looks at Liam and motions to the bed. 

Liam does what Brett tells him to. As he leaves, he hears Stiles say, "Hey."

Liam turns around.

Stiles looks worn out - he's got deep bags under his eyes and they're red rimmed. "Thanks," he says. "For trusting us."

Liam shrugs. "No problem," he says, climbing under the covers. "Night." 

It's ten minutes later that Brett comes to the bed, pulling his shirt off over his head. Stiles is already passed out in the armchair, mouth open and snoring. 

Liam pulls his own shirt off as Brett joins him, hoping to lie skin-to-skin, even if it is only for a little while. Brett's hand lands on his ribcage, the other on his hip - holding him still as he lowers his head to kiss the weal of Liam's scar. 

"I know it's bothering you," he murmurs into Liam's skin.

Liam feels shivers rippling outwards from the spot, like a wave. "It's almost always bothering me," he whispers back. "Don't worry about it." He tilts his head at Scott. "Worry about him. How's he doing?"

"Not that great," Brett admits. "He probably needs a doctor."

"So did I," Liam says. "And I'm alright." 

"This is different. I don't know what he's got and he hasn't been conscious since we met up with them at the warehouse, even when we were moving him." Brett thumbs at his scar, then leans down to kiss it again - his lips linger this time. Liam feels his belly stir.

"You'd better stop that," he whispers. "Otherwise you're going to have a completely different problem on your hands."

"Is that right?" Brett murmurs back, smiling. "Well, not that I don't want to, but with present company taken into account..."

Liam huffs and rolls onto his stomach. "I liked travelling alone," he whines, and Brett chuckles nearby.

Alone. The thought has him turning back to Oakridge; he feels the light-hearted humour of the situation drifting away from him.

"What happens if we get to Oakridge before I turn eighteen?" he asks Brett softly.

Brett's fingers knead the rungs of his spine gently. Then, "We can tell them you're eighteen anyway."

Liam shakes his head. "They won't believe that. Stiles thought I was fifteen." He sighs. "They're probably going to foster me with a family or something," he says gloomily. "I don't - I can't do that. I don't know how to act around people anymore."

"You're doing well with them," Brett says, motioning at Scott and Stiles. 

"Do you remember what happened when I first met you?" Liam asks. "I was so standoffish the first few days you thought I'd decided to become selectively mute."

Brett shrugs. "I was just hoping you didn't decide to kill me." 

Liam smiles a little bit. "I don't think I could kill someone," he admits. "I just..."

He doesn't really know where he's going with that sentence, but Brett nods. "You want to help people," he says softly. "I get it. And killing is the exact opposite of that. That's okay. We're not all made to be able to do that stuff, Li." 

"I can't do anything, though." Liam rolls onto his side, pulling the duvet close. "I don't know how to drive, I don't - I mean I'm missing most of the basic world knowledge everyone else has, I wouldn't have a fucking clue about any of the medications and stuff-"

"But," Brett interrupts, "you can hunt. Not just squirrels and rabbit and snare animals, either, you hunt big game and you do it well. You've got great intuition, you can track, you know how to fight and maintain weapons. Just because you don't have the same skill set as everyone else doesn't mean yours isn't valuable."

Liam smiles. He does feel a little better for that. 

"Let's sleep," Brett murmurs. "Got a fair bit to do tomorrow morning - and you spent most of the day skinning and prepping all that game."

Liam yawns. "Mm. I am tired."

"Good." Brett curls his arm over Liam's waist. "Go to sleep, then."

So Liam does.

~*~

He wakes up to the sound of rain pattering on the skylight.

Just as he's opening his eyes blearily, he hears a boom of thunder. Beside him, Brett shifts quietly, then goes still - he's lying with his leg slung over Liam's hips, his arm across Liam's chest, his nose tucked against Liam's bare shoulder.

Liam smiles sleepily, turns his head to nudge Brett's forehead with his own. Brett doesn't stir. Liam stares at his face for a long moment - at the sweeping fans of Brett's lashes, the whiteness of his teeth behind his lips, the slow, lazy writhing of his tattoos as he breathes.

His stomach turns painfully with emotion. If something happens to Brett, he won't know what to do, other than probably kill himself. It's not like he has anyone other than Brett in his life. And it wouldn't even be the being alone that would really get him; it would be the fact that he'd failed to protect Brett that would probably drive him over the edge. 

_How did I do it before_? He wonders, reaching up with his free arm to stroke Brett's hair.

He hears a cough to his left and turns his head. It's Scott; his eyes are open.

Liam feels a blush sweep rather spectacularly up his chest and into his neck and face. "Sorry," Scott croaks. "Uh - I didn't mean to..." 

"That's okay," Liam says faintly, moving Brett's limbs and sitting up. "Do... do you need anything?"

"Do you have any water?" Scott croaks.

Liam nods, sliding out of bed and making sure to toss the covers back over Brett's form. He picks up a shirt and a water bottle on his way to the couch. 

"What's that?"

Liam looks down; Scott's looking at the scar on his chest. "Oh," he says. "I got stabbed. It's fine now though."

"It's fine now?" Scott rasps disbelievingly.

Liam helps him drink. "Yeah," he says. "It still hurts sometimes, but it doesn't really slow me down. Mostly 'cause I don't let it." When Scott's done drinking, he puts the water bottle away and shrugs into his t-shirt. "Do you need anything else?"

"Nope." Scott looks around. "Is this your place?"

"Sort of. For now. We move a lot." Liam shakes his head. "I don't know how long we'll stay here." 

"You move a lot?" Scott asks. "Why?"

"We're trying to get somewhere." Liam shakes his head. "Well, I guess. We're not sure it's real. How'd your people end up in Ashburton? And when?"

"About three weeks ago," Scott says.

Liam's stomach sinks. He hopes there's people left for Scott and Stiles to save.

"Were you being serious about them being cannibals?" Scott asks.

"They were going to sell me into a slave trade and turn Brett into Sunday roast," Liam says softly. "And they really would have. I got stabbed just trying to get him free. I really think they would've done it." Then he blinks. "Wait - three weeks ago?"

"Yeah." Scott sits a little, coughing. "Do you know something?"

"Not really," Liam says hesitantly. "Just... I know that we only left about two weeks ago. We didn't see anyone coming in or out but we thought it was weird that there were no Keepers... no zombies, either, even where there'd been a herd a while before."

"You didn't see anyone?" Scott asks.

"I mean," Liam rushes to say, because Scott looks devastated, "we only had access to three tunnels out of the city. The Keepers guard all the rest. So they probably went in there. And we-"

"Scott?"

Liam shrinks back a little bit; Stiles is awake, and Liam doesn't want Stiles to think he was hurting Scott. He watches Stiles sit up, not even seeming remotely sleepy.

Scott smiles, wanly, and that's when Liam remembers he's still sick. "Hey, Stiles," he says.

Stiles spares Liam a brief glance before coming over to them. "You doin' okay?" he asks Scott.

"Yeah. I feel a lot better." Scott gestures at Liam, who's trying to make a quiet exit. "Liam gave me some water. He was telling me about the Keepers."

Stiles looks at Liam now - Liam wishes Brett would wake up. "What do you know about them?" Stiles asks.

"Just what I've already told you," he says. "They're not very friendly. We didn't really know how unfriendly until I ran into one in a pharmacy." He looks over his shoulder again, at Brett; he doesn't want to talk about that. "Then one of them caught Brett. We got out of there but only just. Left the city as soon as we could."

"Where are you going now?" Stiles asks.

"Oakridge," Liam says. "But we can't find it on any maps." He sees a flicker of recognition in their faces. "You've... heard of it?" 

"We've met a few people who were heading that way," Stiles says. "Actually, a lot of people. But we've never met anyone from there."

"Never?" Liam asks. "Like - you haven't, or no one has?"

"No one has," Scott says quietly. "We're beginning to wonder if it even exists."

Liam sits up straighter, and Stiles says, "You don't think it does either, do you?" 

Liam shakes his head.

"So why are you trying to go there?" Stiles asks. "It's safer to just stay put now."

"Because his friends are going there," Liam says, gesturing at Brett. "And I don't - I don't really have anyone else." 

Their faces soften a little at that. "No one?" Scott asks. "What happened to your family?"

"I don't know. I got separated from them. I was with a group for a while, but that... didn't work out. I'd been alone for more than a year when I met Brett." He starts putting some water over the fire, hoping to get some breakfast going. "What about you guys?"

"We were roommates," Scott says. "So right from day one we were together. We've got a group. It's not huge, maybe a hundred or so people."

"A hundred?" Liam asks weakly. "That's pretty big."

"Supposedly Oakridge has over five hundred," Stiles says.

"What?" Liam blinks. "There's - there's no way they could feed that many people," he argues. "It would be too big, and-"

"You guys started without me?" Brett's voice asks. Liam turns to find him pulling on a shirt and heading over to sit next to Liam.

"Sorry," he says. "Didn't mean to wake you up." 

"You didn't," Brett yawns. "Hey, Scott. How're you feeling?"

"Better," Scott says, although he does cough in the aftermath. "Thanks for helping us out." 

"Yeah. Even after, uh..." Stiles waves at Liam sheepishly. "We kind of just... reacted."

There's a pause; Brett's watching them both, almost calculatingly, like he's not sure he really believes what he's being told. "It's cool," he says finally. "He's fine. He's got a hard head." 

"Hey," Liam grumbles. 

"Listen, um," Scott says. "We left some stuff behind. We were hoping to go back and get it." 

Brett sits back, close to Liam - close enough that Liam can feel his body heat, which is enough to put him at ease. "Hate to break it to you, Scott, but you aren't going anywhere," he says softly. "Not for a while at least. You've got pneumonia I think. Usually gets a lot worse before it gets better."

Liam sure as shit knows that; he's never gonna forget the sound of Brett's coughing waking him up at all hours of the night, wet and thick and dangerously wheezy. 

"I'll go then," Stiles says. "We kind of need it, so, you know. Mortal peril."

"You can't go alone," Scott says. "Not-"

"I'll go with him," Liam volunteers.

They all turn to look at him; Liam stares back belligerently. "What?" he demands.

"Why?" Stiles asks suspiciously.

"I have to check all the snares," Liam says. "I was gonna have to go anyway." 

"You're gonna kill more bunnies?" Stiles asks.

"And feed you, yeah," Liam says.

"Okay, enough arguing," Brett says tiredly. "Honestly, you're like two kids or something. You sure you wanna go, Liam?"

"Yeah," Liam says. "If he gets annoying I can just shoot him." 

"That's offensive," Stiles says.

"You're offensive," Liam replies irritably, throwing a tea towel at him.

"Jesus Christ," Brett sighs. "Okay. Fine. Liam, just make sure you're back quick, okay? Don't get caught in the storm. It'll be a nasty one." 

"Yessir," Liam says, saluting as he heads upstairs to get changed.

"Kids these days," Stiles mutters.

"I heard that!" 

"You were supposed to!" 

~*~

"Three. Three bunnies, Liam."

"Three dinners," Liam shrugs. 

"It just seems so-"

"Wrong," Liam finishes for Stiles. "I know. Look, you don't need to keep pointing it out. I don't like doing it. But someone has to and Brett doesn't know how to hunt properly yet." 

Stiles opens his mouth, then closes it. For a moment, Liam thinks they're going to have silence - for the first time in twenty minutes - but then Stiles says, "Thanks for sharing with us. I mean, we did kidnap you. You didn't have to do that." 

Liam shrugs. "Honest mistake, right?"

"Yeah. Still, though. Scott was pretty torn up about it. Kept saying Stiles, I can't believe we just drugged and kidnapped a kid. I can't believe we did that."

"If it's any consolation, you aren't the first," Liam says. "And honestly I think that's probably the most diplomatic way I've ever dealt with anyone."

"I feel like that has more to do with Brett than it does to do with you."

"You're right about that," Liam says. "This way."

"You know the way to the warehouse?" Stiles asks.

"Yeah. I've got a good memory for stuff like that. Maps and shit. Had pretty much all of Ashburton memorised before we left. Now I'm just confused." 

"You don't seem that confused. You're walking very purposefully. Like you're going somewhere."

"Don't wanna get munched on," Liam says. "There's that."

There's another pause, and then Stiles clears his throat. Liam rolls his eyes, wondering what inane comment he's about to make next. Stiles talks a lot just to fill the silence, which Liam finds a little irritating. As far as he can tell, none of it is intelligent.

"Hey, can I ask you something?" Stiles asks.

"Sure." Liam's realised Stiles talks a lot, but he doesn't really seem to expect a response.

"When was the last time you saw a biter?"

Liam stops walking and turns around to look; Stiles is holding his baseball bat by his side, watching Liam curiously. "Ages," Liam says. "I actually kinda wondered about that. I feel like I've seen lots of zombie corpses, but no zombies. The last time I saw any was... back in Ashburton. Only a few, too - Keepers. Before that, there was a herd, a huge one, in one of the tunnels. But when we left it wasn't there anymore. You?"

"Not for a really long time," Stiles says, walking to keep up with Liam. "It's freaking me out."

"You too, huh?" Liam asks dryly.

"Brett doesn't care?"

"I don't care that much either, as long as they're not near us. But yeah. It's pretty weird. We've just been worrying about other people so much we haven't thought about it."

"Those guys really wanted to sell you as a slave?" Stiles asks.

"Yeah. They like kids." Liam steps over a few broken planks, carefully. "Careful of those. The nails might have rust on them. One through the foot and you'll have tetanus before you know it." 

"Right." Stiles is at least keeping pace with him, which Liam can't say about many other people he's encountered. "How'd you get away?"

"The first one got munched on by a biter," Liam says. "Then his buddy was the one who caught Brett. Got into a fight with him. I won. Sort of."

"Sort of?"

"I got stabbed. But I'm alive and he's not. So I won." Liam peers into a few storefronts as they pass by; he can tell Stiles is off to his left somewhere. "What, you've never been in a fight like that?"

"Not really," Stiles says. "Scotty and I only just joined the scouting teams a few months back. Until then we worked inside the camp. How the hell did you win a fight?"

"I'm tougher than I look, I guess. What're we going back for?"

"We had some info on where our people might be," Stiles says. "It's in Scott's pack, which we sort of left behind in our hurry to make sure he didn't choke to death. We sort of need it." 

Liam shrugs. "Don't need to justify it to me. Just curious." 

There's a long pause; Stiles seems to be thinking about what he said. Overthinking, rather, which Liam has the idea he probably does a lot of.

"You ever think about stopping?" Stiles asks.

"Stopping?" Liam questions.

"Yeah. Like - I dunno. Not doing it anymore. Just... finding somewhere to put down roots and stay."

"Put down roots?" Liam wrinkles his nose. "I'm seventeen, dude." 

"You know what I mean."

"I had roots," Liam says. "In Ashburton. I was there for more than a year on my own. Good set up, too. And then when Brett came, we must've been there for three or more months - you know, waiting out the worst of the winter. This is the first time I've been on the move since then. I don't like it much." 

"You don't?"

Liam shakes his head. "We don't stay anywhere long enough to make it defensible," he says. "Which leaves us wide open if someone decides to attack us. Plus every time we pick up and leave we lose stuff, and we have to cart all the food around, which sucks. I mean, whatever it takes to find Oakridge. But yeah. Good set up back home and... I mean, if it weren't for the Keepers, I probably... well, I would've taken longer to decide to leave."

Stiles nods. "Reckon you could show me where that place was on a map?" he asks. "If Scotty and I go there to save our friends, it'd help to have somewhere to hole up."

"Sure. I can show you." 

They're at the warehouse; their footsteps echo across the floor as they head to where Scott and Stiles were sleeping. "Why didn't you find a better place to stay?" Liam asks.

"We didn't exactly think we'd be here long. Time sensitive case and all that. The day we got here was the day we ran into you. Then Scott got sick literally overnight." 

"That's what happened with Brett last winter. I think it only took a few hours for him to get bad."

"And you didn't?"

Liam shrugs. "I haven't been sick in years. Well, I did get an infection when I got stabbed, but I haven't had the flu or that nasty pneumonia that seems to go round when it gets cold. Guess I'm lucky." 

"Yeah," Stiles says slowly. "Lucky."

Liam narrows his eyes. "What's that supposed to mean?" 

"Only survivor of your last group," Stiles says. "You're seventeen years old and you were alone for more than a year? And nothing untoward happened? And you took out two Keepers who wanted to rape and sell you? Keepers?"

"Whatever your point is, get to it," Liam says coldly.

"What'd you do?" Stiles demands. "Who'd you sell out? Those Keepers left you alone-"

"They didn't know about me. They had no idea I was even th-"

"And now you're just mindlessly following Brett to somewhere you don't even think exists? Something doesn't add up - every conflict you've been in, you've won, and you're a fucking kid. So what'd you do to your last group?"

Liam steps forward, his heart pulsing with rage, his ears ringing. "I didn't do shit," he hisses. "My last group? We were in the tunnels. Some stupid half-assed mission. My boyfriend at the time got bitten. I carried him back to the rest of the group and I held him down while they amputated his arm. It took two minutes. Two minutes and it wasn't enough. It took _days_ for him to die, and when he did, I was the one who put him down before he could come back. By that time, half our group had been infected or killed or had defected elsewhere, and the rest followed along pretty quick smart. I got out and I stayed on my own because people are fucking cowards and they can't be trusted." 

"You were on your own because you were traumatised," Stiles says softly.

"Call it whatever you want," Liam says coldly, shoving Scott's backpack into Stiles' arms. "Doesn't change anything. Once Scott's better you two can fuck off to Ashburton and get yourselves killed. Don't say I didn't warn you."

~*~

Liam spends the rest of the day and most of the night treating Stiles to an icy silence.

Scott and Brett are obviously wondering what happened, but nobody says anything, and Liam ignores every apologetic look thrown his way.

"You gonna be shitty with him till they leave?" Brett asks him quietly.

"Yep," Liam says stoically.

"You gonna tell me what happened?" 

Liam sighs; they're lying in bed together, about to go to sleep. "He basically said he thought I killed off my whole last group or something," Liam says. "And he thinks I'm using you for my own personal gain or whatever."

"Jesus," Brett says quietly. 

"He also thinks I'm traumatised. Don't comment on that." 

Brett stays silent; he seems to know Liam doesn't wanna talk about it, because after a while, he says softly, "Night, Liam," as he draws Liam closer to him and gives him a small kiss. 

"Night," Liam says softly. 

~*~

When he wakes up in the morning, the fight to stay angry has almost completely left his system.

He gets up, goes outside to piss, washes his hands, and goes back in. Stiles is already awake, sitting at the fire and cooking breakfast.

Liam accepts the bowl of oatmeal Stiles passes him with a sigh and mumbled thanks.

"I'm sorry," Stiles says.

"Let's not talk about it," Liam replies tiredly. "I don't want to. It doesn't matter anymore anyway." He winces; his side is giving him grief today, but he still has to go out and check the snares. They still need to eat, and Brett's the one with the most medical knowledge, so he has to stay here with Scott. 

"How's Scott?" Liam mumbles.

"Been better," Stiles says tensely. 

"He'll be okay," Liam says. "Second day's always the worst." He stabs moodily at the oatmeal. Ever since going out with Stiles, the word traumatised has been floating around in his brain, eating at him, and he's fucking sick of the echoing of it.

"Liam," Stiles says. "I-"

"Drop it," Liam says, putting the oatmeal down. "I'm going out."

"If you go out on your own, Brett's going to-"

"Brett doesn't tell me what to do," Liam snaps. "I'm going. Tell him whatever you want." 

With that, he jerks his pack and crossbow off the ground and heads out. It's freezing cold again, sky rumbling threateningly like it's going to rain, but Liam doesn't care. 

He heads for the tallest building he can find - which isn't very tall, considering the size of the town they're in - and makes his way to the roof. Still no walkers. Liam's starting to get pretty worried about that; he can't work out why they haven't seen any so far. 

He sits up there for hours. He thinks about Garrett a lot; thinks about the countless hours he spent trying to nurse Garrett back to health, even after it became apparent that the virus had already taken hold of his system, that it wasn't blood loss. 

He hears a door opening and turns around.

Brett sighs, looks at him with concern. "Figured you'd be up here."

"Hi," Liam says miserably.

Brett comes over and sits down. "Stiles told us you left. I knew you'd come here."

Liam doesn't say anything. He doesn't care that Brett somehow knew he'd find the tallest building he could; he looks down at his crossed legs, plays with his shoelaces. Brett watches him sadly.

"I told him to go to sleep," Liam says softly.

Brett looks up at him.

"When he was dying," Liam clarifies. "Garrett, I mean. I told him to go to sleep. That everything was gonna be fine when he woke up. That was the last thing I ever said to him."  
Brett's face crumbles in sympathy. He watches Liam for a moment, but Liam looks away.

"I'm fucked up," Liam says after a long moment of silence.

"We're all a little fucked up," Brett replies quietly. "It's okay."

"No offence, Brett," Liam mutters, his voice cracking, "but I don't think you're as fucked up as me." 

"You aren't fucked up," Brett says quietly. "So maybe Stiles is right and you're traumatised. Anyone would be, Liam. And even if you are, you can heal from that. You can come back from it. Trauma doesn't have to be your identity."

Liam rubs his eyes. "You're doing that thing where you're too smart for me to understand," he croaks.

"What I mean is," Brett says patiently, "you don't have to lose yourself to it. It doesn't have to become everything you are. You're so much more than all the shit you've been through. I know you - I know you probably can't work out how to go about recovery, but I'll be here, yeah?" 

Recovery. Liam swallows. This whole time, he's been pretending that his recovery was a physical thing, a symptom that could be healed. He'd never really stopped to think about everything that's actually happened over the last two years.

He looks up at Brett. "We should go back," he says quietly. "Stiles and Scott... is Scott okay? I'm sorry, I didn't mean-"

"He's fine," Brett interrupts. "And you will be as well."

"Sorry I wandered off."

Brett shakes his head, standing up, and helps Liam to his feet. "I just don't understand why you always choose tall buildings," he says. "It's kind of scary."

"I like being able to see everything. Did Stiles tell you I was gonna launch myself?"

"He implied it."

"You know I wouldn't, right?" Liam asks. "If I was gonna kill myself, I wouldn't jump."

"Wouldn't you?" Brett asks sceptically.

"Don't wanna come back," Liam says softly. "And we both know that can happen."

"I'd make sure you didn't," Brett says. "That you didn't turn, that is."

Liam remembers begging Brett not to let him turn when he was delirious with fever, and Brett promising that he wouldn't. He smiles and nods.

"I wouldn't let you either."

Brett leans forward and kisses him, softly, for a few moments before pulling away. "I know," he says softly. "Thanks." He gestures. "You wanna go back? It's pretty cold out."

"Yeah," Liam agrees.

~*~

By the time they've gotten back, Liam's decided, with some reluctance, that he's just going to let everything go. 

He doesn't like being angry, that's the thing. It's a self defence mechanism. He doesn't want Stiles to tiptoe around him for the rest of the time they're there - which will be a while, because Scott's still pretty sick.

So, that night - when he's about to skin another rabbit - he says, "Hey, Stiles, can you help me with this?"

Stiles goes a little pale, but he follows Liam into the small courtyard. The sun is setting, but there's enough light left to be able to skin one little rabbit.

"Is this when you lure me into the alley and kill me?" Stiles asks.

"No." Liam smiles at him. "We're okay, yeah?"

"We are?"

"Yeah." 

Stiles nods uncertainly. "Okay. If you say so. Do I, uh, do I really have to help with that?"

"Not if you're gonna pass out," Liam says, noting, with some interest, how white Stiles is getting.

"Then I'd better go back inside," Stiles says. 

Liam shrugs. "Suit yourself."

"I had a pet rabbit once. When I was ten. I taught it to solve mazes."

"That's fucked up, Stiles," Liam says.

"Hey, he enjoyed it! And I gave him a carrot every time he got to the end." There's a pause. "Now that I think about it, I probably conditioned him into liking the mazes because he knew he'd get a carrot if he solved it."

Liam shakes his head. "I feel sorry for him."

"He was a pretty well fed rabbit," Stiles says with a shrug. "It doesn't - oh my God." He's just witnessed Liam pulling the skin swiftly off the rabbit's carcass. "Okay. I'm out."

"See you later," Liam calls absently.

~*~

Scott gets significantly worse over the next day.

They set up a system: someone is with Scott at all times. Liam gets nervous whenever he's on shift, because he's not quite sure what to say or do to help when it isn't Brett. Not that it happens often - mostly he's the only one fending for them right now.

The thing is, Brett always had the medical side covered, and Liam always had basic survival. They both worked on scavenging and looting, but Liam's the one bringing in all the fresh meat, and now that there are four mouths to feed, he's having to go out a lot more to hunt. He's exhausted; he's leaving just after the sun rises and some nights he comes back just before dark, passes out the moment his head touches the pillow, only to wake up with ripping pain in his side from physical exertion. Then he wakes up the next day and does it all over again.

Stiles usually comes with him. It would be dumb for Liam to go without backup, and Stiles is terrible at sitting still and not running his mouth. Liam's learned to tune out most of what he says, thankfully, or these trips would probably be hell for him.

"So," Stiles says. They're making their way to where Liam thinks there might be a doctor's office. "How did you and Brett...?" 

Liam stops at the intersection, looks both ways, and turns left. "Found him when I was out scavenging," he says. "He was pretty bad off. Just wanted to get through to Oakridge. I tried to get him out through a tunnel, but it was filled with biters. After that, I couldn't find a way out for him before winter hit."

"And then?"

"And then everything went wrong. I got a concussion, then I fell through ice. Brett got pneumonia and was laid up for almost two weeks; that was when that Keeper nearly - yeah. And then he got kidnapped and I got stabbed. It was right after... right after he stitched me up, really."

"Sounds like you owe him."

"I do." Liam perks up when he sees what looks like a doctor's clinic. "This could be it." 

"Why're we coming here anyway? They don't keep meds on-site anymore."

Liam shrugs as he paces, looking for a way in. "Brett said to come here and look for anything that might be useful."

"How can you tell what's useful?"

Liam holds up the slip of paper Brett gave him. "Shopping list." 

"Right."

"It's okay," Liam says, jiggling the doorknob to the place. "I asked him to write it in English."

The door's locked, and finding a way in proves difficult until Stiles decides that their best shot is to simply break the window. Liam protests, but there really isn't another way in, so he can only hope there's no alarm in there, powered by a backup generator, that might go off.

There isn't, and they're inside almost immediately. It's dark; Liam takes point with his crossbow while Stiles follows along behind, shining the torch over his shoulder.

"Good thing you're short," Stiles whispers.

"Shut up." Liam pushes open the doors to reception; the room is empty, even of corpses. The smell of rotting food comes from the small fridge in the corner. 

"Check the fridge," Stiles whispers.

"You check the fridge."

"I have a sensitive stomach, Liam." 

"Who says I don't?"

"The numerous rabbits piled up to be eaten."

Liam scowls at him, but he recognises that it's mostly just teasing, and leans over to pull the fridge open, covering his nose.

Stiles gags, and the torchlight wobbles. But Liam catches sight of a few bottles of water in there, and water never goes amiss. He looks up; there's cupboards above his head.

"Aim up there," he murmurs to Stiles.

Stiles focuses the light on the cupboards, and Liam begins to open them, sorting through everything up there. Sugar, flour and cocoa are all fairly useless - and probably bad by now - but he does catch sight of some powdered Gatorade that he snatches up.

"Still good," he says. "Wish I had this when the codeine was making me puke rainbows."

"That's disgusting, Liam." 

Liam shrugs. "C'mon. Let's go find what we're looking for."

"And what's that?"

Liam pulls out the list, thankful to see that Brett's written it in large block letters - he doesn't have his glasses and he doesn't want Stiles to know he needs them anyway. 

"This seems pretty straightforward," Stiles says, leaning over his shoulder. "Do you know what you're looking for?"

"Not the top two. But the rest, yeah." 

"Alright. I'll look for the top two, then. Meet you back here once we've found everything?"

"Sure." Liam pauses to take out his own torch, then parts ways with Stiles, heading down to the storage rooms at the back.

He knows what he's looking for. Garrett was asthmatic too, so finding a spacer shouldn't be too hard - he thinks most doctors' offices have them now. Or had them. While he's at it, he'll look for more Ventolin. 

At least Brett's not asthmatic, he thinks as he keeps checking doorways. I might have shit vision but it's nothing life threatening. 

He makes his way into a storeroom at the back and pushes the door open, lifting his crossbow and flashlight at the same time. A bolt of pain spears down his chest, radiating outward from his old wound.

Liam grimaces, pushes his hand against the muscles there, hoping for some relief, as he leans on the wall. The pain's been getting worse lately, but he hasn't told anyone - there've been bigger things to worry about. Like food, Scott's pneumonia, Oakridge, the weather, supplies... 

There's never gonna be a good time to say to Brett, "Hey, my side is killing me and I think I really need to rest". The last couple of nights he's woken to it searing with pain, and he's laid there and grit his teeth and dealt with it in his effort not to wake anyone up. 

Maybe things would be different if it was just Brett around. But it isn't just Brett. And he doesn't want Stiles and Scott to think he's weak, or that he could potentially lose a fight. He trusts them... almost. He also feels like they're not telling him and Brett everything.

He finally finds a spacer, in one of the boxes, and grabs it. Next up is the needles Brett's been wanting. Liam's not sure what for, but he gets them anyway.

"Fuck," he breathes as his side twinges. "Okay, fine." 

He's already heading back towards reception when he hears a crash, and then Stiles yelling. He takes off, mindless of the pain in his side, and follows the noise of a struggle all the way to the first room in the place.

He hasn't seen a zombie for so long that he's surprised to see Stiles fighting one off; he raises his crossbow, out of instinct, and shoots.

The zombie drops, an arrow clean through its skull. Stiles stares at him, panting.

"Got the drop on you, huh?" Liam asks.

"Yeah."

"Are you bit?"

"No, I'm okay."

Liam tries breathing evenly - letting his breathing labour always leaves him feeling much worse. "Alright," he says. "Let's go then. I've had enough of this place."

Stiles follows him out - Liam's relieved to be back in daylight and moving at a normal pace. The pain has faded to a low, warning ache, but he knows it'll get better if he rests for a little while.

"Thanks," Stiles says.

"Don't mention it." Liam shakes his head. "Haven't seen one in ages."

"Yeah," Stiles murmurs. "Reckon he was a survivor? Died and turned in there somehow?"

"Probably. He didn't look as decayed as the rest."

Their trip home is quiet after that; Liam's tired and focused on getting home and getting into the warmth. Stiles seems a little shocked by how close he came to being biter food, as well.

Finally, the apartment looms in sight, and Liam sighs with relief as he pushes open the door, toeing his shoes off before stepping inside.

"Hey, you're back," Brett says.

Liam steps inside, shaking his hair and ignoring the way Stiles splutters in disgust as he's promptly flicked with droplets of water. "Yeah," he says. "It's raining."

"Couldn't tell." Brett gets up and grabs a couple of towels, handing one to Stiles before using the other to scrub at Liam's hair. "Hey, look at that. You're blonde again." 

Liam glares at Brett from under the towel, but Brett only chuckles and scrubs his head harder. "Pretty bad weather, huh?"

"Yeah. It's shit," Liam says. "I'm gonna go shower."

"It's not like you'll get warm," Stiles says.

Liam shrugs, heads upstairs. He's barely undressed when the bathroom door opens.

He jumps, but it's just Brett - standing there with a pile of relatively clean clothes in his hands, and a towel. He smiles gently.

"Brought you these."

"Thanks," Liam says, not making any effort to cover himself up. Brett's eyes are skimming his body, almost hungrily.

"What?" Liam asks softly.

"Turn the shower on," Brett says.

Liam grins to himself as he turns around and turns the water on. The shower's loud, and combined with the rain on the roof, he's at least ninety percent sure Scott and Stiles won't be able to hear anything.

Brett's already hard when he backs Liam against the counter, his gaze hot and smouldering in the dim light. "I've missed being close to you," he mumbles as he presses in between Liam's legs. "Every night, I've wanted to..."

"Me too," Liam whispers back, and he doesn't protest when Brett's hand slides under him, between his legs, slick with lube. He leans his forehead against Brett's collarbone when the cold touches him briefly, and then Brett's pressing inside. 

Liam has a feeling this is gonna be a pretty short, intense session, but that's okay, because that's how he wants it. He's unbuckling Brett's belt and pulling at his jeans even as his hands shake and his dick throbs needily.

"What brought this on?" he murmurs.

"You look hot when you're wet," Brett replies softly. 

Another finger slips inside him, and Liam tries to reign in a gasp - he's gonna have to at least try to be quiet, but Brett's scissoring him and his body is purring with pleasure. He's at least got his hand around Brett's dick now, stroking it, and Brett's doing the same for him. 

"Have I ever told you how good you feel?" Brett mumbles. 

"Only every time you're inside me," Liam groans back.

"Not enough, then." Brett seems to be done fingering him; they've been up here for under ten minutes, and Liam's already about ready to explode. 

"Where do you want me?"

"Counter," Brett says immediately - and Liam knows he probably put at least some thought into this. "On the edge." He helps Liam up. "Yeah. Like that." With that, he's rolling a condom on and slicking himself up with lube; Liam watches eagerly.

"You ready?" Brett asks. "Or do you want me to stretch you more?"

"I'm ready," Liam breathes, gripping the edge of the bathroom counter with his hands. 

Brett holds one of his hips as he starts to guide himself in - Liam moans brokenly as the head of Brett's cock pushes, then slips inside him easily. Now that he's not tense anymore, or worried that it's going to hurt, it's much easier to let Brett in. And it's not like they've done nothing since their first time, either - Liam's grown accustomed to twice daily orgasms, and he's missed this. 

"Move," he breathes to Brett, and Brett starts pumping in and out of him. Liam holds Brett's shoulder with one hand, steadying himself; from here, he's got no control over the angle or how he's sitting, but Brett's already found his sweet spot, so he supposes that means this is a pretty optimal angle. 

"Fuck," he whimpers. "Brett-"

"I know," Brett whispers. "I know, baby. Shh. I'm gonna make it good for you, I promise."

His next thrust has Liam's dick blurting a stream of precome; he's not going to last long, and he's probably going to come without even getting a hand around himself, which is fine by him. 

"Liam," Brett groans quietly. 

"Yeah." Liam leans himself forward, catching Brett's lips in a kiss. His legs are shaking where they're squeezed around Brett's ribcage; he can feel Brett's thrusts getting less and less rhythmic. "I love having you inside me," he whispers.

This time, it's Brett who whimpers, stopping for a moment before picking up again. Liam strokes the back of Brett's neck, closing his eyes, biting his lip at the sensation of Brett stretching him out so thoroughly. 

"I love how well you take care of me," Liam mumbles shakily. "How good you feel." 

"Liam, fuck," Brett pants. "I'm gonna-" 

"I love feeling you come inside me," Liam breathes, clinging to Brett for dear life; he's fucking close, and he knows he'll blow as soon as Brett does. "Come on, Brett. Please?"

Brett lets out a startled half-moan, half-gasp, and then he's twitching inside Liam, his hand tight on Liam's hip. He thrusts twice more, slamming Liam's prostate - and Liam follows right along with him, whimpering quietly as he shoots all over his chest and stomach. 

There's a brief pause after that as they both try to catch their breath; then, slowly, Brett pulls out of him, ties off the condom, and throws it into the bin in the corner.

He turns back to Liam, face red and sweaty, and chuckles. "That's a pretty good sight," he teases.

Liam blushes; he's still sitting on the counter, legs open, covered in his own come. "Guess we should actually shower and go downstairs," he says.

"Hmm. Let me help you get clean."

They don't stay in for long; when they're out, Liam dresses into the clothes Brett brought up for him - sweats, a hoodie, some socks. Then they head back downstairs - and Liam's body is still sort of sighing with pleasure at every movement.

Stiles looks at them both when they come in. "Takes two people to shower, huh?" he asks flatly. 

Liam blushes.

Brett shrugs. "Guess so."

"You know, not everyone is getting to have orgasms every day," Stiles whines. "At least keep that in mind when you go to fuck each others' brains out."

"Stiles," Scott says, sounding appalled.

"What?" Stiles whines. "Scott, I have not had sex in literal years. If someone doesn't take pity on me soon I'm going to go crazy!" 

"Well, it's not gonna be us," Liam says cheerfully, swinging an arm over Brett's shoulders - with some difficulty, given how tall he is.

"That's just cruel, Liam, okay? Because we know now. We know you two have sex and we don't get to. And this part of we is going to be thinking about it all day!"

"You're gonna think about us having sex?" Brett asks, seeming mildly disturbed.

"I'm going to try not to," Stiles grumbles. "It'll make sharing a living space with you both very awkward if I do." 

"You didn't know we were having sex before?" Liam asks innocently.

Stiles' eye twitches, and he turns to Scott. "Would you look at this kid?" he demands. "He's seventeen years old and he's getting laid more regularly than I am, Scott. And he's fucking smug about it! This is what everything has come to."

"It's... not really the worst thing that could happen," Scott says, smiling a little. "C'mon, buddy. There'll be more survivors-"

"Stop placating me," Stiles grumbles. "We would have to find them first. And there's no guarantee they're not psychotic, either."

"Brett and Liam aren't."

"They're also taken. By each other."

"Are you gay?" Liam asks, tilting his head.

Stiles flounders for a moment. Then, "I'm not entirely opposed to the idea of - well - you get the idea." 

Liam nods thoughtfully. He's starting to get a good picture of what's going on here; Stiles is in love with Scott. And Scott doesn't know. It's going to be pretty awkward when he eventually finds out, Liam supposes, but he and Brett might not be around to see that.

"Okay," Liam says. Stiles is watching him like he's realised that Liam's worked him out. Liam shrugs at him.

After a long silence, Brett says, "So... dinner?"

~*~

Liam wakes up because he thinks he might be dying.

There's pain burning its way up his side and through his ribs - he only remembers it being this bad once, when he had the infection and thought he'd been bitten.

He's letting out a low whimper of pain before he can stop it, and Brett stirs next to him. He tries to keep quiet, to keep still, curled up on his side, but Brett's already awake.

"Liam?" he asks softly.

"Yeah?" Liam croaks.

Brett sits up. "What's wrong with you?" he murmurs. 

"It's my side," Liam pants. "It's killing me."

"Let me see," Brett says helplessly, pushing Liam's shirt up. "It doesn't look-"

"Well, it feels like it's on fire," Liam moans. He's resisting the urge to squirm because fuck, he knows it won't help, he really does, but he just - can't deal with the pain like this, a thousand times worse than it has been since he actually got stabbed. 

Liam pushes his head back into his pillow; the pain is so bad he's sweating and trying really hard not to cry or breathe or move.

"Fuck," Brett murmurs, his hands skimming Liam's torso. "Liam-"

"What's going on?" Scott's voice asks sleepily.

"He's got an old injury." Brett's hands are fluttering over him helplessly. "I think it caused muscular damage to the area around his ribs and now this happens whenever he's worked too hard."

Liam feels Scott's hands on his arm, gentle, and tries to relax under the touch. "What do you normally do?" Scott asks helplessly, looking down at Liam with his eyebrows furrowed. Stiles appears next to him, mouth open, eyes concerned. And Liam hates that they're all staring down at him helplessly like this.

"Normally I'd use ice, but now that winter's over there isn't any. Tylenol barely even touches it and it takes half an hour to work anyway-"

"Uh, guys, you better do something soon," Stiles interrupts nervously. "He looks pretty white." 

"Do you trust me?" Scott says to Liam.

Liam takes a moment to realise Scott's addressing him and nods jerkily. With that, Scott's hands are off his arm and probing his chest wall, near the scar. Liam whimpers and arches his back as the pain intensifies. 

"Scott," Brett says warningly.

"Just give me a second," Scott pleads. "I know it's-"

He touches the area just above the scar, and the pain suddenly and abruptly fizzles out. Liam swallows, holds his breath for a moment, convinced the pain will return - and, when it doesn't, he slowly breathes out and relaxes back against the mattress.

It's quiet for a moment. The only sound is Liam's laboured breathing. 

"Thanks," he says weakly.

"No problem." Scott looks shaken, but his fingers are massaging the area softly. "Better?"

Liam nods. 

Brett's hands strokes his hair back. "You okay?" he asks softly.

"Yeah." Liam swallows. "Doesn't hurt anymore." 

Brett looks at Scott. "What'd you do?" he breathes. "I've never been able to get it to stop." 

"My girlfriend is into acupuncture," Scott says. "It always helped me. There's these muscles in the chest wall that react to breathing... mine used to hurt after I'd had an asthma attack. Fingers aren't as good as a needle, but..."

"But it's working," Brett says. "Thank you."

Scott nods. Liam shifts, mostly to remind them he's actually still there. As he does, he catches Stiles smiling at him - almost relieved.

"You wanna take over?" Scott asks. "I'll show you how." 

"Yeah. Okay." Brett moves around to Liam's other side, replacing Scott's hand. "That still feel okay?"

"Yeah," Liam says sleepily. "S'fine." 

"Oh, how nice. We save him from agonising pain and he starts to fall asleep on us." 

"Fuck you, Stiles," Liam yawns. 

"How long has this been going on?" Scott asks Brett quietly.

"Since it happened, almost. Used to use codeine to manage the pain but - codeine doesn't agree with him. I mean, I think I told you, nothing really does, he's pretty sensitive to most drugs." Brett shakes his head. "I thought it'd stopped... I didn't hear him the last few nights." He's looking at Liam as he says it; Liam looks away. 

"We have a doctor," Scott says. "At our camp. She could take a look at him. Make sure everything is okay." 

Liam tilts his head back. "Why would you offer something like that?" he asks quietly.

"You helped us," Stiles says. "Least we can do it return the favour. Besides, you dropped that geek that was gonna eat me today."

"Yeah, you owe me," Liam breathes, closing his eyes. 

Stiles snorts. "I take it back. We're leaving you to suffer."

"Stiles," Scott rebukes. 

"What?" 

"I think he's falling asleep," Brett murmurs.

"M'not asleep," Liam mumbles.

"Yeah, but you are slurring your words," Brett teases. 

"Whatever," Liam murmurs, and that's the last thing he remembers.

~*~

When he wakes up the next morning, it's because he's warm.

He sighs, stretching his legs a little bit, and tries to go back to sleep, but someone's snoring pretty close by and it's hard to ignore.

"Knock it off," he mumbles. "Brett. C'mon. Roll over, Jesus." 

He opens his eyes, intending to push Brett off him and onto his side so he'll stop snoring - and yelps with surprise when he sees Stiles, no more than a few inches away from him, his arm beneath Liam's head and his lips level with Liam's forehead.

The noise Liam just made must rouse him, though, because he jerks, sitting halfway upright, and says groggily, "What? What happened, who's dead?"

"No one's dead," Liam says weakly. His heart is pounding with surprise. 

Stiles looks at him. "What the hell did you - oh. Oh."

"Dude," Liam protests weakly. "I don't mind some snuggling, but at least warn me first, you know what I mean?" 

"Sorry," Stiles says sheepishly as he disentangles himself from Liam's body. "Scott and Brett told me to keep an eye on you." 

"That wasn't an eye, that was your leg and arm and most of your body - and your eyes were closed!"

Stiles narrows his eyes. "Then you should be grateful that I kept more than one eye on you, shouldn't you?" he asks.

Liam can't help but laugh a little at that - which seems to thoroughly confuse Stiles, because that narrow-eyed look of suspicion falls off his face.

"Where's Brett and Scott?" Liam asks, suddenly remembering what Stiles said about them wanting him to keep an eye on Liam.

"They went out foraging," Stiles says. "So I stayed here with you." He looks suddenly seriously. "You, uh... last night..."

Liam remembers, then; the agonising pain of having to draw breath, Brett helpless to do anything, and then Scott, massaging a spot above his old injury, the pain fading away. He thinks there was talk of a doctor, too. 

"I remember," Liam says. "Thanks for staying."

"Yeah, no problem," Stiles says.

They stare at each other for a moment - and Liam realises, belatedly, that Stiles has literally no idea what to do with him. 

"Want breakfast?" Liam asks.

"Yeah, sure," Stiles says hurriedly.

"You don't have to be nervous around me, you know. And you definitely don't need to entertain me." 

"Right," Stiles says blankly. "Sorry. I haven't seen an actual teenager in a really long time."

"We're not that uncommon," Liam says sourly. "And I'm almost eighteen." 

"That would still make you a teenager," Stiles points out."You're almost eighteen? When's your birthday?" 

"Um... what month is it?" Liam asks sheepishly. 

"Almost March." 

"It's March sixteenth." Liam blinks. "I didn't realise it was so close. Don't really keep up with the days."

"You gonna do anything for it?"

Liam snorts. "Like what?"

"I'm sure there's a booze shop around here somewhere," Stiles says, a wicked gleam in his eye. "And Scotty makes a mean Bloody Mary."

Liam laughs a little, but the last time he got even remotely tipsy - on that wine and tequila - he ended up horny and with Brett three fingers deep inside him. And not that he's not keen to replay that, he is. Just not while they're sharing space with Scott and Stiles.

He's just beginning to put some water over the fire when the door opens, and Brett and Scott walk through. They're both smiling, which Liam supposes means they're getting along - not that he could imagine anyone not getting along with Scott. 

"Hey," Brett says when he sees Liam. "You're awake. Feeling better?"

"Loads," Liam says.

Brett slumps down onto the mattress next to him. "Been awake long?"

"Not really. Stiles snores. It woke me up."

"You rat," Stiles says, glaring at Liam. Liam snickers. 

They spend the day resting. Liam wants to go out and check the traps, but Brett looks pale at the prospect of him leaving. He knows he scared Brett last night - scared all of them, probably, not that he can blame them. 

"So... guys," Scott says.

Liam looks up. That tone of voice is nothing good; he's immediately nervous.

"We wanna find our friends," Scott says softly. "In Ashburton. Liam, you showed Stiles on the map how to get there. That's great. But-"

"We said we'd take you to see our doctor," Stiles says.

Liam swallows. "Don't put off saving your friends for me. I'm-"

"You're getting worse," Stiles says. "We can all tell. It could just be all the moving but it could be more serious than that."

Liam looks at Brett - and realises, when he finds Brett already looking at him, that Brett knew this conversation was going to happen. That he'll do anything to get Liam to a doctor, especially after last night. 

"We figured you guys could come with us," Scott says hesitantly. "You don't have to help us with our friends. But..."

"But there's no point just hanging out here if you might not make it back," Liam says bluntly. "I get it. I don't like it, but I get it." 

He's trying not to be angry. He doesn't want to go back to fucking Ashburton. Brett spent three or four months trying to convince him to leave, and now he wants to go back? Just because, at the end of the day, Liam might get to see a doctor for something that might not even have a solution? Fucking fantastic. 

"Okay," he says. "Fine. Back to fucking Ashburton it is."

~*~

Liam hates everything.

He's stuck in the car with Stiles, Scott and Brett, and Stiles will. Not. Stop. Talking. Liam's going to go crazy if they keep going much longer.

Not only that - his whole body is in total lockdown. He's freaking out. They're getting closer to Ashburton now that they've been travelling for most of the day and night - swapping driving shifts - and every part of Liam wants to turn back to Warranwood and stay there until the rabbit population is decimated and he's forced to go elsewhere.

"Liam?"

Liam looks up. Scott is staring at him.

"You're pretty quiet," he says. "You okay?"

Liam nods, then directs his gaze back to the window. He can practically feel the other three communicating about him, even though Brett's sitting right next to him.

His "spidey senses", as Brett would call them, are going haywire. He doesn't trust this, any of it; something about the emptiness of the highway is grinding him down, and there's just... he feels like Scott and Stiles aren't telling them everything about why their friends were taken, what intel they have... why they even think they're still alive, considering the Keepers are cannibals.

But he doesn't know what's going on and he can't put his finger on what's freaking him out. And until he can, he's not willing to say anything.

~*~

He dozes for a bit. When he wakes up, they've switched drivers - Scott's in the driver's seat, Stiles is riding shotgun - and asleep - and Brett's in the back with Liam.

Liam lifts his head, which, until then, had been on Brett's shoulder. Brett's sleeping too. 

He notices cars drifting past on the road. "How close are we?" he croaks.

"Pretty close, I think," Scott says. "You were asleep a while."

"Sorry." Liam feels kind of useless; he's not good at driving yet and no one wants him behind the wheel with his side the way it is. 

"Don't apologise, dude." Scott smiles at him in the rear-view mirror. "Probably needed to sleep, right?"

"Mm." He looks around a little more; one side of the road is covered in trees, thick and dark, and Liam realises, with some trepidation, that the sun is going to set soon.

"Reckon you could wake Brett up?" Scott asks. "His turn next."

"Yeah." Liam momentarily mourns the loss of his warm Brett-pillow and turns to him. "Brett," he says sleepily. "Wake up."

Brett almost snaps awake, his eyes flying open and his hand gripping Liam's shoulder. "You okay?" he croaks.

Liam nods uncertainly. "Yeah, it's... almost your turn to drive."

"Okay," Brett sighs. "Sure." 

Liam's just turned to the front of the car when there's a bang, and Scott yanks the wheel - Liam's confused for a moment, even as he realises that one of their tyres has burst, and that they're going way, way too fast to stop. 

The car spins; Stiles is awake and yelling in the front seat, and Scott's trying desperately to get the whole thing back under control. Liam sees the line of trees ahead, realises they're about to barrel right off the road.

"Scott, look out!" Liam yells.

There's a brief second where everything seems to slow down - Liam sees the thick row of forest ahead of them, sees the multitudes of scrap metal wrapped around trees and posts, looks up at the sky, which is black with an oncoming storm. 

Then the world breaks apart around him and he realises, distantly, that they've hit the tree, and someone's yelling, but Liam can barely hear it - he's momentarily stunned as the sky is suddenly outside his car window, as rain start pelting down on it.

Then he feels an explosion of pain in his head, and the world goes black.


	17. Chapter Seventeen - Lies Of Omission

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WELL WELL WELL  
> WOULD YOU LOOK WHAT THE SLIGHTLY BEDRAGGLED UNI STUDENT DRAGGED IN  
> This chapter finally begrudgingly agreed to be written. It's almost an intermediary between the last one and the next, but hopefully it clears some stuff up.   
> Enjoy! <3

**Chapter Seventeen - Lies Of Omission**

_The water is icy cold, making Brett gasp as he steps into it._

_It seems like every winter is colder than the last, and every winter, Brett seems to have forgotten just how bad the last one was._

_"Fuck," Liam grumbles._

_Brett turns to find him entering the water too, nipples peaked with the cold. Liam's got blood on him - they've just finished dispatching a few zombies, which is why they're rinsing the guts off in the water._

_Liam forgoes submerging himself in favour of simply splashing the water up onto his torso. His teeth are chattering, but hey, he's alive and safe._

_"First zombies we've seen in a while," Brett comments to Liam._

_"Yeah." Liam's shivering wildly. "Did they seem fresh to you?"_

_"I didn't pay that much attention, really," Brett admits. "Why?"_

_Liam shakes his head. "It's just... if they're fresh, it means there were other people here. Recently. I just don't... I don't wanna think that there were people we could've helped out there, you know?"_

_Brett nods. "They still smelled bad," he offers. "Not that fresh."_

_Liam nods, but he still looks fairly troubled. Brett knows it weighs on him, the pressure he puts on himself to help and save others in the same predicament they're in. He's not surprised Liam's labouring on it._

_"You wanna start heading out to the tunnels again?" he asks. "Pick up survivors?"_

_Liam hesitates, then shakes his head. "Might not be safe," he mumbles._

_Brett watches him. Liam's experience with the Keepers has really rattled him; at first, Brett thought Liam had managed to mostly brush it off, but the further away the threat of winter and exposure gets, the more and more evident the residual trauma becomes._

_Liam doesn't have to think about surviving through the cold anymore, and that leaves him to deal with everything else that's happened. Brett's woken in the middle of the night to Liam crying in his sleep, or sitting near the fire, shaking, or awake, eyes open, but curled up with his arms over his head like he's trying to protect himself._

_There's not a lot he can do. Realising that sucks. This is the kind of situation that, really, requires therapy. Brett's tried coaxing Liam into taking better care of himself emotionally, but every time he comes even close to the topic, Liam shuts down._

_He knows that part of Liam's reluctance to journey out to the tunnels, to look for survivors, is because he doesn't believe there's anyone out there worth saving anymore. He's stopped taking the lead where decision-making is concerned, too, letting Brett make nearly all of the executive decisions - like where to go, when, what to look for._

_Despite the fact that Liam fought the Keeper off, rescued Brett from Trent, and narrowly avoided being sold into slavery, his self-confidence is shattered. And there's no amount of stitches, pain medication, or sleep that's going to fix that._

_Brett can only hope that something happens, soon, that might restore Liam's faith in himself. Because the way they're going, he's not convinced Liam's ever going to successfully reintegrate into society._

_At least, not while he's convinced everyone's going to hurt him._

~*~

Rain.

There are droplets of water coursing down his body; he blinks his eyes open, a little, then all the way. His vision is blurred and cloudy.

_Where am I?_ He wonders woozily.

He sits there for a moment before trying to move, panicking when he realises he can't. That's when he notices that his chest is straining against a seatbelt, that it's holding him in place - he's sideways, parallel to the sky, and the seat next to him is empty.

The seat next to him.

Liam.

Suddenly, he's with it again; he's straightening out and looking around. The glass on Liam's passenger side door is shattered and bloody, the seatbelt torn. Brett swallows, his heart racing as he tries, in the darkness, to make out whether or not there's a lot of blood on the seat. He can't see properly, though. 

"Liam," he whimpers, struggling weakly. "Liam?"

No answer. Liam's not here. And Scott and Stiles - Brett remembers they're with them, suddenly. Scott and Stiles are silent in the front seat. He can hear breathing - Scott's, judging by how wheezy it is - but he can't hear Stiles. 

Where the fuck is Liam? He's starting to panic - Liam's gone and all that's left is a ripped seatbelt and some blood on the glass. Someone had to have taken him. 

He's gone. Brett feels dread rising in him at that. He's gone. Someone took him. Someone had to have taken him. He's probably hurt, he probably can't defend himself. I have to get out of here and find him.

But even as he twists, his chest erupts into pain bad enough it makes his breath catch. Probably from the seatbelt jerking him back into place.

Brett moans helplessly, an animal noise of fright and pain. Liam's gone and he can't help. He wasn't there to protect him.

"Liam," he croaks desperately.

"Shut up!"

He jerks his head up - and there's Liam, leaning into the window and staring down at him, looking sort of irritated but mostly relieved.

"Li?" he rasps.

"Yeah, it's me," Liam says. "Shut up though. I think there might be biters around. We need to be quiet."

Brett stares at him - Liam's face is really cut up, and there's blood all over it and his neck and chest. There's blood matting his hair to his forehead, too. "Are you okay?" he asks.

"I'll live." Liam reaches into the car, gingerly, avoiding the glass, and touches Brett's face. "I'm gonna get you out of here," he says. "I just haven't worked out how."

"How did you get out?"

"I broke the glass and climbed," Liam says. "Probably a really dumb idea 'cause I cut myself pretty badly but the doors are fucked and won't open, and I don't think I could push that weight even if they did." Then he's straightening up and looking around. "Fuck," he murmurs. "There are definitely zombies."

"Get outta here," Brett says. "Don't-"

"I'm not leaving you behind," Liam says stubbornly. "Besides, where would I go?" 

"It's raining," Brett says.

"Yeah, nice observation." Liam's chewing his lip. "If I helped you, could you get out?"

"Maybe. I don't know how bad I'm hurt."

"You're not bleeding anywhere - I checked before. Scott and Stiles too. They're both alive - Stiles is bleeding, though." With that, Liam's climbing back into the car, wincing, and taking out his knife. He squashes in between Brett and the door, then says, "Try not to squish me," before reaching up and cutting Brett's seatbelt.

Brett braces himself as much as he can, trying not to let his shoulder and hip squash Liam, but Liam does inevitably end up wheezing with the extra weight on him.

"Okay," Liam groans. "Get off."

Brett starts levering himself up, slowly. His head is spinning, but he knows he has to get out of the car. So he boosts himself onto the box between the seats and then, with what feels like his remaining strength, out the window. 

He struggles onto the side of the car, and is about to lean down to help Liam when Liam's head appears, then the rest of him, wriggling as he struggles up to join Brett. It's raining pretty hard, he realises, and Liam's soaked and shivering.

"You need to get warm," he croaks. "Where did you go?"

"I was trying to find shelter," Liam says. "Even if we just hole up till morning and then leave." 

"You find anywhere?" Brett asks.

"There's an RV on the main road." Liam points off to the side, in the direction Brett assumes in the highway. "It's not great but it'll do. Some of our stuff might be salvageable. I got all the packs and stuff out, took them there already."

"How long have you been awake?"

"Like an hour, maybe more." Liam looks around nervously. "We can't stay," he says. "I think I heard walkers." 

"Alright, okay, um - we need to-"

"Get Stiles and Scott." Liam nods. "They aren't awake and I can't move any of you on my own. I don't even think we could move them together."

"Alright." Brett shakes his head to try and clear it. "Alright, we need to - get as much stuff to the caravan as possible. Then we need to try and wake up Stiles and Scott, get them out of here." His eyes ghost Liam's form. "God, you're shivering."

"It's been raining since before I woke up," Liam says. "I'll be fine." He looks down at the ground. "Can you climb?" he asks hesitantly. 

"Maybe." He's feeling pretty short of breath. "What do you have in mind?"

"The car has a sunroof," Liam says. "If we get around to the other side, we might be able to get Scott out. After that we should be able to get Stiles."

"Why didn't you use the sunroof?"

"Not enough room for me to get to it," Liam says. "Plus, I kind of panicked. I just wanted to get out."

"I don't blame you," Brett says. "Alright. Let's try the sunroof. See if we can wake them up."

Liam nods, then begins lowering himself carefully to the ground, landing on his feet confidently. He's clearly been moving up and down the car to check things out - he doesn't move with the hesitancy of someone who doesn't know what they're doing. 

Brett grits his teeth and tries to follow suit, but his ribs explode into a fiery mess of pain, and he grunts as he falls to the ground. He didn't realise before, but his leg is injured too somehow - twisted, maybe. He can stand, but walking will be painful.

"You okay?" Liam's helping him to his feet.

"My ribs are busted," Brett groans.

Liam looks alarmed. "Busted? As in broken?"

"Probably. They feel broken." Brett leans against the car, wincing. "It'll be fine. Just gotta rest them."

"Easier said than done," Liam says worriedly. "You wait here. I'll check the sunroof - watch out for zombies, okay? Haven't seen any in a while, we're probably rusty." After a moment, he passes Brett his crossbow.

"Liam-"

"You can't take a zombie on right now hand-to-hand," Liam says. "Not with busted ribs. You need a ranged weapon. That should do the trick." 

"Alright," Brett says. "But I'm coming 'round the other side with you. I'll cover you while you try to wake up the others." 

It takes Liam a little while to get the sunroof open - he has to pry at it with his knife, and Brett feels useless, standing by while Liam does all the work. He hates being injured, but he's glad that Liam, at the very least, seems unharmed, apart from a few cuts and scratches.

"This is a tough fucking window," Liam grunts.

"It should be. It's part of a car."

There's a cracking noise as the spring holding the sunroof breaks under Liam's force. Leaving the knife wedged in there, Liam tugs at the edges, eventually succeeding in prying it loose. 

"Scott?" he whispers. "Stiles?" 

Brett hears rustling in the trees, a few groans. "Hurry, Liam," he says tensely. "We've got company."

"Fucking awesome." Liam reaches into the car, shaking Scott's shoulder. "Scott?" 

No reply. Liam stands up and turns to Brett.

"Give me the crossbow," he says. "You try. I'm moving easier than you."

"Liam-"

Liam sighs, and Brett hands over the crossbow, hoping against hope that he's able to wake Scott up relatively quickly, then reach Stiles. They can't just leave them behind. 

Well. They could. Brett feels guilty for even briefly considering it, but it does cross his mind - if they left now, Scott and Stiles would have no idea what happened to them. They could carry on with what they were doing before.

"Brett," Liam says tersely, "uh, what're you waiting for?"

"Sorry," Brett says, leaning into the car. "Scott, hey," he says, shaking him. "Scott."

He hears Liam's crossbow fire, then the thud of a body hitting the ground. "How many?" he asks.

"Only a few at the moment, but there's gonna be more," Liam says. "We need to work faster."

Brett bites his lip as he leans closer - his ribs are twinging warningly, and he doesn't have a very good range of movement right now. "Scott," he whispers. "C'mon, dude, we need to move. Scott."

Scott groans lightly, and Brett's heart jumps hopefully in its chest. "Scott," he whispers again.

"Brett?" Scott asks woozily.

"Yeah, it's me."

"Hurry up," Liam hisses, and there's the sound of another body hitting the ground wetly. 

"He's barely awake," Brett says.

"He'll be barely alive if we move any slower!" 

Brett turns back to Scott. "Hey, listen, you've gotta get moving," he says. "There was an accident. Stiles is hurt. We don't know how bad, but we need to get him up out of the car and away from here - Liam's covering us, but there are zombies, and if we use the guns we're screwed." 

Another thud. "Guys," Liam says nervously. "I'd move soon." 

"Okay," Scott groans. "Just tell me what you need me to do."

"Alright. C'mon, you need to get out of the car. Then we can get Stiles."

They make quick work of Scott's seatbelt, and he manages to awkwardly shimmy out through the sunroof - he's wheezing, and Brett realises that he probably needs his Ventolin, spacer and to sit down, but they aren't out of the woods yet. 

As he straightens up, Liam's firing another bolt - dropping his fourth zombie in as many shots as he fires. There are more exiting the treeline, though, and even though they're moving slowly, it seems like they're going to keep coming.

"They're too close," Liam says quietly to Brett and Scott. "I can't hit all of them."

"Okay, we'll work faster, then," Brett says. 

"What if I lead them away?" Liam asks. "Buy you some time?"

"No," Brett snaps. "It's dark, it's wet-"

"You're hurt, Stiles is unconscious and Scott can barely breathe!" Liam hisses. "I'll meet you at the highway."

With that, he pulls a gun out of the back of his jeans - Brett makes a note to teach him about gun safety if they all make it out alive - and takes off, away from them.

"Liam," Brett says desperately. He wants to shout, but that would make Liam's effort useless.

They both jump as a shot rings out, and the zombies start to become restless - their occasional throaty groans turn into a cacophony of noise, and they all turn simultaneously to where Liam is disappearing into the trees.

"Has he done that before?" Scott asks shakily.

"Once," Brett says. "C'mon. Let's get Stiles."

~*~

_Week five._

_Liam's not as salty. Still screws his face up whenever Brett makes a reference to his age or height, but seems to begrudgingly accept that Brett's going to tease him no matter what._

_Brett's realising every day that Liam has to be one of the most efficient survivors he's ever come across. The rigid routine he has down-pat has helped them survive every storm, every near food shortage, every cold night or blustery day._

_The routine is great. Getting Liam to break from the routine to focus on other stuff? Not so simple._

_They've gone to a different area today - Liam's run out of ideas on places to loot, so Brett's circled somewhere on the map and they're heading there. Liam notes, somewhat nervously, that a herd used to be around here, that he doesn't know if they're still around._

_They need the supplies, though. So they continue on. Surviving is taking risks, now. The people who don't take risks die. Then again, most of the people who do take risks die too.  
You never think you're gonna be the one, Brett thinks as they enter an area unfamiliar to him. You never think you're gonna be the one, and then one day, you are. It's you saying goodbye and leaving people behind._

_"Stay close," Liam says quietly._

_"I was planning on it." Liam's a fucking impeccable shot with the crossbow. Brett watches as he slinks forward, carefully, threading his way between parked cars and tanks, footsteps practiced and near-silent._

_He follows Liam's path. It's safer that way. If no zombies have risen from Liam walking over them, they're not going to rise for Brett either._

_Liam stops when he reaches the corner, and his arms fall down to his sides._

_"Liam?" Brett asks. "Hey, look, I know I'm kind of useless, but-"_

_Liam's whiter than snow, he realises, his blue eyes standing out vibrantly against the pallid backdrop of his skin. Brett turns to look at whatever's got Liam's attention._

_In front of them, barely more than fifty yards away, is a veritable wall of walkers._

_There must be hundreds, Brett realises as his heart rate starts to increase rapidly. Maybe even thousands that we can't see._

_"Um," he says._

_That's when he notices that the zombies are shambling towards them, rapidly, groaning and almost screeching. Liam takes a step back, runs into Brett's chest, grabs his arm, and says, "Run."_

_They floor it. Brett follows Liam back through rows of cars, right up until they hit what looks like a dead end. Liam spins around._

_"Go that way," he pants, shoving Brett towards a tiny, concealed alleyway. "There's a ladder. I'll meet you up there."_

_"What about you?"_

_"Need to distract them - this is the only way on or off the roof. Go. I'll be there soon." With that, Liam's taking off, ducking down the side of a building and bashing the butt of his crossbow against the cars, yelling and generally making a lot of noise._

_Brett hauls ass, finding the ladder at the end of the alleyway and scaling it two rungs at a time. All he can think is that he needs to help Liam somehow._

_By the time he gets to the top, though, he can't see Liam - only hundreds of zombies, all milling in the street below. His stomach rolls, ears ringing. If Liam's down there somewhere, becoming a feast for the fucking walkers, and it was all to save Brett-_

_He catches movement, too fast to be a walker, and sees Liam emerging from under a parked car, away from the zombies. Quickly, he starts making tracks back towards the alley.  
Brett follows his movements until Liam's out of sight, then heads back to the ladder. Liam's on the last few rungs as Brett reaches it._

_"Hey," Liam pants._

_Brett reaches down to help him, feeling nothing short of terrorised, and pulls Liam up onto the rooftop. He's shaking so hard he thinks he might fall apart._

_"Brett?" Liam asks. "Are you-"_

_Brett leans over and pukes over the edge of the building, then wipes his mouth on the back of his hand._

_"Dude," Liam says, wrinkling his nose._

_"Sorry," Brett says faintly. "I don't think I've ever seen a herd that big."_

_"Yeah. It's fucked up," Liam says._

_"Well, that's succinct. But yeah." He looks Liam over; he's soaked with sweat and panting harshly, a few scrapes on his arms. "You okay?"_

_"Yup. You?"_

_"Think so. Apart from the puking."_

_Liam stands up. "Bet you wish you had my terrible sense of smell right now, am I right?" he asks, holding out a hand._

_Brett takes it and lets Liam pull him upright. "Thanks."_

_"No problem." Liam heads to the edge of the building and stares down at the ground below, whistling quietly. "Fuck. Look at 'em all."_

_Brett joins him. There are hundreds, in the alley below, already becoming distracted and despondent now that their immediate food source has disappeared. "I can't believe you distracted them," Brett says. "That was dangerous."_

_"We're alive, though," Liam says, then sits down against the wall that surrounds the rooftop exit. "Well. I guess we wait now."_

_"For what?"_

_"For them to fuck off."_

_Brett laughs a little and joins him. "Got any food?"_

_Liam scoffs. "Do I have any food. What kind of question is that? Of course I've got food." He opens his pack and produces a bottle of water, two tins, and a package of meat. "Here."_

_They sit and eat for a while, pressed shoulder-to-shoulder for warmth - the roof of the building is cold, but they're safe for now, and the moaning below is beginning to get fainter and fainter._

_"So," Brett says. Liam looks at him - actually looks, without trying to avoid his eyes. "You're pretty fast."_

_Liam smiles a little. "Yeah. Guess so. I mean, you only gotta be faster than them, right?"_

_"Right." Brett swallows his last bit of meat. "We should head back soon. Getting dark out."_

_"Yeah. Alright. Let's go."_

~*~

Getting Stiles to the highway proves difficult.

Freeing him from the car wreck was the easy part - Scott pushes and Brett pulls and together, they manage to get him down to the ground. He's bleeding pretty badly from a cut on his leg but Brett can't see in the half-light how bad the wound itself is, so all they can do is wrap it and head to the highway.

"You got a plan?" Scott pants.

"No," Brett says. "But Liam does."

"Liam does?"

"He's already been up and moving for a while - said he found an RV." Brett looks up, spotting only one RV on the highway. "Guess that's it."

Damn, Liam, he thinks nervously. That's not very far from the crash site. What were you thinking?

Still, they get Stiles inside and onto the bed, and Brett looks to the floor. Their packs are there, most of their supplies, too. Liam must've made a few trips. 

"Industrious little bastard," he says as he reaches for the medkit. "Alright. Help me with this." 

~*~

Stiles has a four and a half inch gash on his upper thigh that's still oozing blood slowly by the time Brett gets to it.

He's unconscious for the disinfecting process and stitches, and that's good - Brett's never going to forget the way Liam whimpered and squirmed when Brett stitched him up. Still, Stiles being unconscious is bad news - he's barely shifted at all since they got him out of the car.

Two hours after they get back, Brett's pacing up and down nervously. Liam's still not back. He's still not back and it's still raining out there - unless Liam found shelter, he's probably soaked through to the bone and freezing.

"He'll be alright," Scott tries to reassure him. "He'll be fine. Didn't you say he's pretty good at surviving?"

"Yeah. He's also fast. He should be back by now," Brett says despairingly.

"You should eat something," Scott says. "Being hungry isn't going to help him."

Brett shakes his head. "I need to go out and look for him," he says, beginning to pick up his things. "He could be hurt. He might not be able to move. Or he might be trapped-"

"You can't go out with busted ribs, man," Scott says, clearly upset. "Look - I'll go look for him, okay? I'm fine now-"

"Your asthma is barely under control," Brett says disbelievingly. "If you go out and have an attack-"

The door to the RV opens and Liam stumbles up the steps, dripping water everywhere and shivering. "Hey," he says, teeth chattering. "Sorry I'm late."

"Fuck," Brett murmurs, his head spinning with relief. "Where the hell were you?"

"Had to make sure I lead 'em away," Liam stammers. "So they wouldn't follow me back here. How's Stiles?"

"Fine." Brett starts stripping Liam's coat off. "Shit, you're frozen," he murmurs. "Scott, can you toss me that blanket?"

Scott hands it to him, and Brett continues to pull at Liam's clothes; Scott turns away as his shoes and jeans come off too. Liam's fingertips are white and pasty, fingernails and lips almost blue. Not hypothermic, not yet, but not far off. 

"Need a fire," Liam stammers.

"Yeah, I'll make one soon." He gets the blanket around Liam's shoulders. "Sit down and get warm, would you?" 

Liam sits on the couch, shivering violently, while Brett gathers the stuff they need for one of Liam's indoor fire pits. Scott hovers for a few moments before grabbing another blanket and swaddling Liam in it.

"How far did you go?" he asks Liam shakily.

"Couple of miles." Liam's teeth are still chattering; Scott starts rubbing his arms as Brett gets the fire going. "Had to draw 'em out. There's so many - we can't - stay here for long."

"We can't leave either," Brett says, pulling Liam onto the floor so he's closer to the fire. "Stiles can't move far."

"What's wrong with him?"

Brett starts trying to towel Liam's hair dry. "Huge gash on his leg," he says. "It's got a pretty good chance of getting infected, given that we were in the car so long and the wound was exposed."

"Medicine," Liam says.

"Yeah," Brett says. "We're gonna need a shitload of medicine. First things' first though, we've gotta get you warm." 

Liam shakes his head. "Stop worrying about me," he croaks. "Worry about yourself. Your ribs are busted and Scott sounds like a dying engine." 

"I'm okay," Scott says. "Mostly." 

"Right." Brett looks at Stiles. "Look, we all need some rest - Scott, I'm gonna set an alarm to go off every three hours. We need to wake him up and make sure he's coherent."  
"I can do that," Scott says. "You guys sleep."

"Really?" Brett asks skeptically.

"Yeah. Besides, I'm probably going to need my inhaler every three hours anyway," Scott says ruefully. "It might as well just be me."

Brett hesitates. Then he sets the timer for three hours, hands it to Scott, and says, "His name, your name, how you met. Don't let him sleep if he can't answer them, and wake me up."

"Got it," Scott says softly, retreating to the bed. Brett's getting water over the fire, trying to heat it up so Liam at least has something that can raise his core temperature. He's not surprised when he hears Scott start to snore.

Liam coughs a little, then sneezes. Brett pours some of the heated water into a mug and presses it into Liam's hands, then kneels down in front of him.

"You crazy?" Brett asks softly.

Liam smiles at him weakly, still shaking a little, and says, "It worked, didn't it?"

"Doesn't mean it was safe."

"Nothing's safe anymore," Liam points out, and Brett really can't argue with him there. Liam's right - it seems like no matter where they turn, there's danger around every bend.

They sit in silence for a moment. Liam's drinking his warm water, hands still a little shaky. Brett watches the shadows on his cheeks, cast by the long fan of his eyelashes, dance in the firelight. 

"Are you feeling a little warmer?" he asks quietly.

"Lots."

Brett takes brief stock of their situation. Scott's asthma, combined with the remnants of his pneumonia, are making it hard for him to breathe; he's not too badly injured, but he's also not capable of moving too fast or far. Stiles has woken up in brief fits and starts, but he's lost a lot of blood and the gash on his leg looks like it might have cut through a few layers of muscle.

Brett feels absently at his own ribs. At least four of them feel cracked, if not broken, and there's something wrong with his ankle - he can move, but not fast, and not much. 

Liam's unhurt. He's still thawing out from the cold and he's probably tired and hungry like the rest of them, but his wounds from the crash seem superficial - a few cuts and scrapes, a bruise blooming across his forehead form the impact of the car, but otherwise unharmed.

Brett realises Liam's the only one who's even remotely able to hold his own at the moment. He's not sure how he feels about that - on one hand, Liam's not seriously injured, and that's good. On the other hand, Liam's already contending with a previous injury and he's going to have to scavenge and defend the rest of them on his own.

Liam notices him looking. "Quit worrying about me," he says. "Worry about them. And you." 

Brett shakes his head. "I'm worrying about how we're gonna get out of here," he says. "We've got this for now but it's too close to the trees. If the walkers come around this way-"

"They won't," Liam says. "I lead them pretty far away. I wanted to choose somewhere better, but I knew you and Stiles were hurt - I wasn't sure how far you'd be able to walk." 

"Good thinking," Brett murmurs. "You were right. We wouldn't have made it much further. Anyway, we can't stay out here. I'm willing to bet other people pass this way - we can't have anyone knowing we're here. Not when we're hurt like this."

"Got a plan?" Liam asks tiredly.

Brett shakes his head miserably, putting it on Liam's knee. Liam uses one hand to pat his hair gently.

"Gimme a few minutes to get my brain working," he says, "and I'll think of something." 

Brett shakes his head. "We should all get some sleep," he says. "Especially you." 

Liam nods. "What about your ribs?" he asks. "You know, patching them up or whatever?"

"Nothing you can do for busted ribs except rest them, really," Brett says.

"Nothing?" Liam asks.

"Not really. Tylenol, maybe. But you can't splint ribs when they're broken."

Liam ducks his head forward and presses a kiss clumsily to Brett's ribcage, over his shirt. "Kissed it better."

"You're a giant dork," Brett says fondly, reeling Liam in for a hug. "My giant dork." He rubs Liam's back softly, gratified by the way Liam sinks into his body and leans on him trustingly. "Come on. We should try to rest."

Liam nods, offering up the edge of his blanket. Brett smiles; the little couch won't be that comfortable to rest on, but they can make it work if they lie on top of each other. Which honestly, Brett doesn't mind, even if Liam does squirm a lot while he sleeps.

They've just gotten settled when Liam jerks a little and presses a hand against his side. Brett doesn't say anything; he doesn't have to. He knows exactly what's wrong. 

He moves Liam's hand and begins probing the spot softly. It takes him almost two minutes to figure out the angle and intensity, but finally, Liam relaxes against him, eyes closed, letting Brett's fingers work their magic to reduce the pain.

"Good thing we get to see a doctor," he says quietly.

Liam looks up at him silently. 

"I know you don't want to. But you do need to. Just to make sure." 

"What do you think is wrong?"

_The muscles could be severed_ , Brett thinks. _Or there could be nerve damage. Or both_. Instead of saying any of that, he says, "I'm not sure. I'm not a doctor."

Liam looks worried, so Brett tries again. "If it was anything really serious," he says, "you wouldn't be able to move. It's an annoying injury to have, I know, but I don't think your life is in danger or anything."

"What a nice change of pace," Liam says, faux-cheerful, and Brett chuckles, then winces.

"Ribs, huh?" Liam asks.

"Yeah." 

"You could sleep on me," Liam suggests. "I move a lot. I don't wanna hurt you."

"Yeah. Okay." Brett's not going to be bothered letting his masculinity be wounded by curling up on someone smaller and younger than him; once they're repositioned, Brett finds the most comfortable, softest part of Liam's torso - his stomach - and pillows his head there with a sigh.

"Night, Brett," Liam says quietly.

"Night, Li." 

~*~

When Brett wakes in the morning, it's to an empty couch.

His first instinct is to panic, because when he went to sleep last night he had a comfortable, warm, Liam-shaped pillow to sleep on, and said pillow is gone. Not good.

His second thought is to wonder how the fuck Liam wriggled out from underneath him without waking him. But he supposes he sleeps heavily when he's tired and hurt. 

Scott and Stiles are still out to it. Brett gets up - Liam must be close, because the fire has been stoked and there's oatmeal sitting over the top of it - and goes to check Stiles' bandages. 

The wound feels kind of hot. Brett's stomach turns; if they're dealing with a low-grade infection, it might be treatable out here. Somehow, he doesn't think they're gonna be that lucky. Plus, Stiles is probably contending with a moderately bad concussion, what with how sporadic his bouts of awareness have been.

After checking them both, Brett opens the door to the RV. It's sunny out, but freezing cold, and he can't see Liam anywhere.

"Liam?" he asks quietly. He's a little worried, but it looks like Liam left under his own power, so-

"Morning."

Brett jumps, looks up. Liam's peering over the edge of the RV, looking down at him curiously.

"How the fuck did you get up there?" Brett demands.

"I climbed." Liam's head disappears, and soon enough, he's coming down the side of the RV and joining Brett. "Good view up there," he says. "I can see for ages. No zombies anywhere nearby - a few dormant ones about half a mile away. Just standin' around looking dumb." 

"How can you see that far?"

Liam holds up a pair of binoculars. "Been looting the nearby cars," he says. "Found these. And a bunch of other stuff, too."

"Any medicine?" Brett asks.

Liam's face falls. "No," he says. "Nothing hardcore anyway. Stiles is worse, isn't he?"

Brett nods. "His leg is infected. If it doesn't get worse, we might be able to treat it here... but I don't think that will happen. I think he's going to get worse, and quickly." He rubs his face. "How're you doing, anyway?"

The bruise on Liam's forehead looks awful, but he's up and moving around and it doesn't seem to be bothering him at all; miraculously, he's unhurt from the crash and he's bounced back from his jaunt in the rain last night completely. "I'm okay," Liam says. "Headache, but I hit my head." 

"Yeah, I figured when I saw you climbing around like a monkey you were probably fine," Brett says dryly. "I'm glad you're okay."

Liam smiles.

"So what'd you find?" Brett asks.

"Lots of stuff. I put it in the RV already, but loads of people had non-perishables in their cars. Tylenol, over-the-counter medicine, stuff like that. Had to walk out kind of far to be able to find anything good, but we've got supplies now at least."

"Clean bandages?" Brett asks.

"A few. Whatever was in first aid kits." Liam looks a little guilty. "Felt bad for looting the cars."

"Yeah," Brett murmurs. "I know. But nobody's coming back for them, yeah?" 

Liam nods, but he still looks a little distressed. 

"Alright, so, if the area's secure, we should get back inside and see what we can do to help Stiles," Brett says. "There's not much we can do about the concussion - Scott was waking him up every three hours last night, or trying to, but we can try and treat the infection."

Liam nods and follows him up the steps. "What about you?"

"I'm fine," Brett says dismissively. 

Liam bristles. "No you aren't," he says. "Your ribs, and your leg - which I've noticed, by the way - you need to get them bandaged up or something."

"We need all the bandages we've got for Stiles," Brett says, keeping his voice quiet, but letting the urgency bleed through. "If we run out of clean ones, we're screwed."

Liam looks pretty unhappy, but he nods. "Alright." 

"Screwed?"

Brett turns; Scott's sitting up, looking worried. 

"Yeah, screwed," Liam says. "Which is what we're all going to be if we stay out in the open like this. We can't stay here." 

"Where else is there?" Scott asks.

"Warranwood," Brett says. "We can go back there. Get away from the city - from this road. It's too attractive to looters." 

Stiles stirs, mumbles something. Brett and Liam both head closer to the bed.

"What'd he say?" Brett asks.

"He said-"

"No," Stiles mumbles. "We need to get to Ashburton."

"We need to get you medical care," Brett snaps. "Fuck Ashburton. It was a bad idea right from the start."

"They have a hospital there, though, right?" Scott asks desperately. "So there could be stuff there that could help him. That's how you saved Liam, right? By raiding the hospital?"

"The hospital's a really bad idea," Brett says quietly. "Something's going down there. We don't know what, but it's nothing good." He hasn't missed the way Liam's spine has gone rigid with fear. There's no way Liam's going back to that hospital; Brett's surprised he followed him as far as he did the first time.

"Our best bet is getting him to your doctor," Brett says.

"You saved Liam-"

"That was a fucking fluke, Scott! We got lucky! The knife was short, the guy didn't twist it, the edge wasn't serrated, it didn't puncture organs, glanced off his ribs - I can't even begin to stress how fucking lucky he is that it only severed a few layers of muscle and fat! This is completely different! Apart from the blood loss and infection, he's got a head injury, and those can kill on their own!"

"Our doctor's too far," Scott pleads. "C'mon, guys-"

"Too far?" Brett asks. "How far away are you from Ashburton? Why were your people taken and kidnapped to somewhere so far away?" 

"We don't know," Scott says, and the gears in Brett's head start to turn suspiciously. Scott's lying to them - and Stiles might be good at it, but Scott isn't. Brett can tell something's up. Scott and Stiles aren't telling them the whole truth here.

"Liam," Brett says.

Liam sits up a little straighter, eyes on Brett. He looks sort of nervous; Brett's just realised he hasn't contributed to this conversation at all.

"Can you see if any of the cars have clean clothes we could use as bandages?" Brett asks quietly. "We're running low."

"Okay." Liam seems glad to have a reason to leave; he hops off the bed and is out the door before Brett can blink again.

Brett turns to Scott. "Listen," he says quietly. "We can't take him to Ashburton. Right now we can't take him anywhere - he's not strong enough to travel, especially not with the head injury. What we need is to get really fucking lucky and hope that Liam manages to find the drugs we need while he's scavenging the cars."

Scott swallows. "We can't just leave him like this," he says. "He'll-"

"We're not going to." Brett looks down at Stiles, chewing his lip. "You aren't gonna lose your best friend. But before we do anything, we need to work out just how badly he's hurt."   
Scott nods. "Show me," he says. "What to do, I mean. I'll do anything."

"I know." Brett picks up the needle and thread on the table nearby. "Hold him down."

~*~

_Brett's never seen a person as sick as Liam is right now._

_In the few hours since Liam's fever really settled in, Brett's watched, increasingly alarmed, as Liam slips away from him, helpless to do anything to stop it._

_The infection is raging in Liam's body, that much is clear. Brett tries to get Liam to keep drinking, determined to keep him hydrated even as Liam sweats through his clothes, then the towels underneath him, then the sheets and blanket around him. His hair is soaked._

_It's probably about ten hours later when Brett realises the infection is so bad, Liam's side is swollen._

_When Brett notices it, it's because he's changing the bandages - trying to keep the area clean and dry and relatively painless. He peels back the pad, which is smeared with dried blood, and recoils - partly because of the smell, but mostly because visually, the area is a fucking mess._

_The stitches have almost disappeared, and the skin is so swollen, red and shiny that Brett thinks it might burst if he touches it, like an overripe tomato. He touches it, and Liam whimpers, shifts weakly, trying to scoot away from him._

_"It's just me," Brett says, hearing his voice break. "Just me, Liam. It's okay."_

_Liam, miraculously, settles a little at the sound of his voice. Still, even in sleep, he looks distressed; Brett stares at the wound._

_Can't leave the stitches in, he realises. If I leave the stitches in and the wound keeps swelling, I'll never get them out._

_He thinks back to the limited training his old camp's doctor gave him - remembers, vaguely, something about debriding the wound of infected flesh._

_"Once it's dead," the old man had said, "it's as easy as scraping it out and leaving the clean flesh behind. A lot of medical practitioners still use maggots, because they only eat the infected flesh and leave the healthy stuff behind."_

_He doesn't have maggots. He does, however, have a few sterile scalpels and more thread and stitches - disinfectant, now, too, after his trip to the hospital._

_And besides. Liam's too sick to fight him off, even if it does hurt; just looking at him makes Brett feel exhausted. Liam's breath is short and anxious, pulse flying in his throat, his movements sluggish and weak when they do occur._

_"Sorry, buddy," Brett whispers. Then he picks up a pair of scissors and tweezers, using the latter to grip the loose end of the stitches and tug._

_Liam makes a high-pitched, warning noise of pain; Brett winces. "It's okay," he murmurs. "Just me, remember? Just Brett."_

_It only works half as well as before; Brett begins snipping at the threads quickly, pulling them out before Liam can squirm too much._

_The only good thing about this situation is that Liam doesn't bleed when the stitches are out; the blood flow from the initial stabbing has completely stopped. "Okay," Brett murmurs, and then - bracing himself - begins to pry the wound open._

_Liam howls, jerks underneath him, and almost flings Brett halfway across the room - a combination of Brett being too stunned to react and Liam attempting to defend himself. The process rips the IV out of his arm._

_"Fuck," Brett moans, heading back over. He's not hurt, not even a little, but the noise Liam makes when he approaches again goes right through him. Liam's eyes are open, but he's not seeing Brett, that's for sure._

_"No," Liam whimpers._

_"Hey, it's okay," Brett chokes, swallowing down a sob. "You're okay. I'm gonna fix you up, okay?"_

_"No," Liam says again, his voice breaking._

_"Okay." Brett sits down, then, after a moment, realises he's going to have to hold Liam down if he's gonna get this done._

_"I need you to stay still," he says, even as he knows the words are wasted and useless - Liam can't understand him right now, can't realise that it's Brett and that he's trying to help. Brett's not sure what Liam's seeing, but his pupils are blown wide and terrified and they're not even focussed on him._

_Liam breathes out - a small, terrified exhale - as Brett's arm lands across his chest. He doesn't give Liam time to dread the pain; he puts the scalpel back against the wound and begins to scrape._

_Liam screams like Brett's trying to murder him - and maybe that's what it feels like. All Brett knows is that the bloodcurdling noise that leaves Liam's mouth doesn't even sound like him, and it's taking most of his strength to hold the kid down against the bed._

_"Stop," Liam sobs._

_"I can't, I'm sorry." It's a small mercy that the dead flesh is pulling away easily, like pulling paper out of a notebook. "I'm sorry, Liam. I'm sorry."_

_Liam fights him the whole time - crying, screaming, whimpering, wriggling his way through the entire process, trying to get away. Brett succeeds in removing the dead skin and pus five minutes later, on the brink of vomiting. He knows logically that this has to be done, otherwise Liam's going to lose his life - but fuck, he can't get over just how much pain he's inflicting on Liam._

_If these are his last few days, he's not spending them like this, Brett thinks, beginning to wipe down the area with disinfectant. Liam shivers weakly at the sensation, but the worst of the pain is over - and he seems to know that, somewhere deep down._

_Brett elects not to restitch the wound right now. He covers the area with a damp bandage and feeds the IV back into Liam's arm, then swaps out the damp, fever sweat-soaked blanket for a new one._

_"Brett?" Liam whispers._

_Brett jumps. "Hey," he croaks. "What's up?"_

_There's a long silence; at first Brett thinks Liam's gone back to sleep. Then, "It hurts."_

_Brett nods, blinking back tears as he preps an injection of morphine. "I know, buddy. Hold still, okay?" He pulls down the waistband of Liam's boxers, tips him at a gentle angle, and pushes the needle into the tough, large muscle that makes up Liam's hip flexor and upper thigh._

_"I'm cold," Liam groans suddenly._

_Brett feels his forehead. The heat of Liam's skin rages back at him, blistering like a summer's dust storm. He gets more blankets, tucks them around Liam tightly, leaving his arm out so he can access the IV port._

_If Liam dies, he doesn't know what he'll do. If Liam dies, Brett isn't sure he's going to think Oakridge is still worth it. If anything is worth it. He's not sure what his life will look like without Liam next to him, but it's not something he particularly wants to see._

_He lets his hand rest on Liam's forehead for a moment, closing his eyes. He's so hot, he thinks, feeling a bleak sense of despair washing over him. He's so sick..._

_"I can't do this without you," Brett whispers to Liam._

_Liam stirs groggily._

_"You hear me?" Brett asks, voice breaking. "I can't do this without you. I don't want to. So I really need you to get better, okay?"_

_He lets Liam sleep for a few hours._

_He puts the stitches back in. Liam's too weak to fight him off this time around._

_He waits._

~*~

The process of debriding someone's infected wound is only a little less intense when it's not his boyfriend.

Stiles, if possible, makes even more noise than Liam did. But he's a little more coherent, and that means it's easier to talk him down from struggling. Brett can only hope that that turns out to be a good thing, that debriding the wound works, and that Stiles starts to improve.

He stays in the RV for a few hours, resting his ribs a little, keeping an eye on Stiles with Scott. They do inventory. Every now and then, Liam sticks his head in and asks if they need anything in particular, then dutifully heads out again. He hasn't complained once.

Still. Brett's noticing, now, that Scott seems nervous around him - and that he won't let Brett take inventory of his pack. It's pretty standard practice for two people to take inventory of everything, to make sure nothing's missed, but Scott fumbles his way through a half-assed explanation about "personal belongings" (which sounds like a very typical Stiles explanation), and keeps the pack away from Brett.

Brett sits back, watching for a bit. He didn't really need confirmation that they're hiding something, but this is definitely it. He wants to know what's in that pack.

With that thought in mind, he tells Scott he's going to piss and leaves the RV. His luck is good enough that Liam hasn't strayed far away; he's within sight, leaning into the backseat of a car.

Of course he didn't go far, Brett thinks. He's not dumb. He knows he's our only protection right now. 

"Liam," Brett says softly, approaching and putting a hand on Liam's back. He's so glad to feel Liam alive and moving and healthy under his palm that his eyes sting.

Liam looks up; he's been scavenging one of the nearby cars. "Yeah?"

Brett moves in closer; Liam seems to think it's for a kiss, because he smiles and leans up. Brett feels a little guilty at that; he hasn't sought Liam out just to show him affection for most of the day. He leans down and kisses Liam gently.

"What's wrong?" Liam asks. 

"Listen," Brett says softly. "I don't think Scott and Stiles are telling us everything. I wanna get inside Scott's bag - see what they could be hiding from us. You're sneakier than me, and smaller. Do you reckon you could do it?" 

Liam nods. "Yeah," he says. "What do you think they're hiding?"

"I don't know, but they aren't telling us everything, that's for damn sure. Stiles has a good pokerface but Scott's a terrible liar." Brett looks around. "You don't feel bad about that?"  
"No," Liam says. "They should've been honest." 

Brett's not going to question the "eye for an eye" morals Liam's got going on here, not while they're working in his favour. "Okay," he murmurs. "Look, Stiles is still passed out. I'm going to distract Scott somehow. You sneak in, try to find the bag."

"Do you want me to look inside it?" Liam asks hesitantly. "Or do you just want me to steal it?"

"Look inside it. Just in case."

"What am I looking for?"

"Anything that seems weird. That they might not have told us."

"Okay," Liam says. "When I see you leave the RV, I'll look."

It's easy getting Scott out of the RV, and for that, Brett feels almost guilty - but then, if the search turns up nothing, Scott won't ever know, and if it turns up something, Brett's not going to have to feel guilty for having done it. It's a security thing. 

Fifteen minutes after they've left the RV, Brett's run out of reasons to still be outside while Stiles is unattended and Scott's pretty insistent on going back. It's all Brett can do to follow and pretend his leg is hurting too badly to walk along, forcing Scott to help him. 

Scott pushes open the door to the RV.

Liam's sitting there, crossbow in hand, and it's raised and pointed at the door. He looks absolutely fucking livid.

"So," he says, voice shaking. "When were you gonna tell us that you're friends with the Keepers, huh?"

Brett whips his head around to look at Scott, whose mouth is open. "What?"

Liam stands up. "You'd better start talking," he says, voice shaking. "I really, really don't wanna shoot you but I fucking will if you don't give me a reason not to."

"We aren't friends with them," Scott says desperately. "We aren't. You went through my pack, right?"

"Yeah. I saw the photos. You looked pretty buddy buddy with a few of 'em. That girl and the other guy, around your age. So?"

"So there's a snitch in our group," Scott says, swallowing. "We were scouting. Someone ratted us out to the Keepers, told us where we were. They captured a lot of our people - eleven, actually. There were so many of them."

"Yeah, fine, whatever," Liam says. "But that doesn't explain why that guy looks so friendly with some of the higher-up Keepers in the photos."

"You're talking about Theo," Scott says. "Theo's smart. He's probably pretending to be friends with them to stay safe - maybe even keep the others safe."

"I don't believe you," Liam says. "And why send two people on a mission to rescue eleven people against a fucking army? What kind of fucked up plan is that? You said you had a community. Well, no community that dumb has ever lasted, so-"

"We weren't sent!" Scott yells. "We came out on our own! They didn't know about this - they said the resources were a waste and that they couldn't afford to do it." 

"So you risked it all to free people who might not even be alive? What part of cannibalistic slave traders don't you fucking get? Your friends are probably dead!" Liam spits.

"No, no, look." Scott holds out a hand. "We have intel - recent intel - that they're alive. Or they were, right up until we met you guys. That might have changed. The Keepers aren't just kidnapping people to eat them - they're experimenting, we think. Trying to find a cure."

"Sounds stupid," Liam says coldly.

Brett watches Scott carefully. Scott's an awful liar, and his face is clear of deception or guilt.

"I think he's telling the truth," he says to Liam softly. "At least, he thinks he is." 

"We don't leave people behind," Scott says slowly, seeing Liam's resolve waver. "We didn't tell you guys because we weren't trying to hide anything. We're just trying to get our people back."

"This is pretty significant info," Brett says. "You sure your friend Theo is really on your side? And who sold you out?"

"We don't know. And Theo's our friend. He and Stiles-"

Scott cuts himself off, takes a breath, and says, "Stiles thinks I don't know. But they were together. On and off. For a while. He wouldn't hurt Stiles."

"Seems like a snake," Liam mutters, even as he drops his crossbow. "Fine. Whatever." 

There's a tense silence. Liam drops moodily into the couch, glaring at the wall across from him; Scott heads to the bed. Brett opens his mouth to talk to Liam.

"Brett," Scott says, voice alarmed.

Brett heads over - and immediately knows that their situation has gone from bad to worse. 

Stiles is deathly white, shaking, covered in a thick sheen of sticky sweat. He might as well be Liam a few weeks ago, lying on his deathbed from a stab wound.

"We need medicine," Brett says blankly. "Watch him."

Liam's sitting up and watching when Brett reaches him. "What's-"

"We need your map reading skills," Brett says, passing it to Liam. "Where's the closest hospital?" 

Liam blinks at him, but he takes the map to the table and puts his glasses on. He stares down at the map for a few minutes, a pen in hand, drawing lines that make no sense whatsoever to Brett. It doesn't matter, as long as they get the medicine they need. 

Finally, Liam circles two spots on the map, sitting back. He looks like he's teetering on the cusp of a panic attack; Brett sits down next to him.. 

"Liam," Brett says softly. "Which is closer?"

Liam closes his eyes, swallowing. "We're about ten miles out from Ashburton's outskirts," he says quietly. "If you want medical supplies... that's where we'll have to go."

"We need them," Brett says.

Fuck, Liam looks scared - openly scared, too. He's not trying to hide anything. "Brett," he says. "Ashburton... we know it isn't... I know we have to go but - the Keepers might have swarmed where we were before, and we can't-"

"I know," Brett murmurs. "I know. But Liam, he's..."

Liam's eyes flicker to Stiles, then back to Brett. He still looks strung out, but there's something in his gaze that's harder than steel.

"I know. Okay. Okay." Liam wipes his face, clearly distressed. "Brett, I - I'd follow you anywhere, okay? Just make sure it's a good decision." 

"I will," Brett breathes.

~*~

Three things become immediately apparent.

The RV, even though it works, is low on fuel, and it's too big and noisy to take through the city streets safely anyway.

Stiles is going to need constant supervision if he's going to live - meaning regular doses of the limited medication they do have and regular bandage changes. 

Brett's not able to move far enough, fast enough, or regularly enough to be of any use to anyone - apart from maybe Stiles, given that he barely has to move at all for that.

That last one wasn't his realisation. He exits the RV to help Scott and Liam try to find a working car, only to approach Liam and get told, flatly, "You aren't coming."

"What?" he asks.

"You aren't coming," Liam repeats. "You can't. You're hurt." He swallows. "Scott and I talked about it," he says. "You and Stiles are staying here, in the RV, where it's a little less fucking dangerous. We're going to go into the city, find the drugs, and get the fuck out." 

"What about their people?" Brett asks. "What if something happens? What if there's something shady going on at the hospital?"

"If we find their people - and that's a big fucking if, Brett - we'll do what we can to help. If something happens we'll deal with it. And there's definitely shady shit happening at the hospital, but really, there was always gonna be, and Stiles won't live without these drugs, right?"

"Right," Brett says softly. Something about Liam making a decision without him, about him, with someone else, feels strange - even if he knows that it was made to protect him. "Okay."

"We shouldn't be that long," Liam says. "Not really. In and out, right? And maybe we're due for a stroke of good luck. I don't know." 

"Even you don't believe that," Brett says.

Liam shrugs. "I can try. Law of attraction, right?" 

"Right," Brett murmurs. "Be right back."

He goes to find Scott. He still doesn't trust them much. Not after the recent deception - by omission or not, and whether or not it was Scott's decision, it still isn't settling well with him. 

Scott's near the RV, packing up a bag of stuff. Brett approaches with as much purpose and masculinity as he can muster with broken ribs, a jacked leg and four hours' sleep.

"Scott."

Scott turns to him.

"Liam told me about your plan," Brett says. "If he doesn't come back in one piece, you and Stiles are going to have a pretty rough time getting back to your people."

Scott swallows. "I'll bring him back," he says. "I promise."

Brett scoffs. "He'll bring you back, more like. He can take care of himself. But if he gets killed because of you, I'm going to make you regret meeting us." 

Scott nods, looking scared. Liam's packing up his stuff near the caravan.

A lump rises in Brett's throat; he walks over, slowly, and puts his hand on Liam's back, between his shoulders. Liam turns to face him, looking curious.

"Hey," Brett says softly. "Have you got everything?"

"I think so," Liam says. "Enough to get us there, maybe last us a few days... it's not ideal. But we can't take that much stuff once we're actually in there. Too hard to carry if we get cornered or hurt."

Cornered or hurt. Brett shudders at the thought; he doesn't want Liam hurt again, especially when he's not around to try and fix it. He especially doesn't want Liam cornered or trapped with no way out. Not that he can imagine that happening - Liam's smart, and he knows Ashburton off the back of his hand. He wouldn't do this unless he thought he could.

"You know what you're looking for?"

Liam nods confidently.

"Okay," Brett murmurs. Then he steps forward and wraps Liam in a hug, putting his chin on top of Liam's head and trying to suppress the tears.

"Please come back," he says.

"I'm going to. I promise."

"Don't make promises like that, Liam," Brett says. "Please."

"Okay," Liam says, his voice small. "Don't you think I can...?"

"I know you can," Brett says softly. "It's Scott I'm worried about. Don't get yourself killed for him, okay?" He starts rifling in his pockets. "Here. Take this with you."

"What is it?" Liam takes the bottle of pills. 

"Vicodin. This dose isn't as strong as the codeine pills we have - it shouldn't knock you around as much. It's in case your side starts to hurt."

Liam nods and pockets it. "Thanks." 

They stare at each other for a moment. "We should go," Liam says quietly. "The sooner we leave, the sooner we get back. In theory, anyway."

Brett nods, but that annoying lump is back in his throat. "Okay," he croaks. "Okay, I'll - I'll see you soon."

Liam nods. "Take care of yourself," he murmurs. "Your ribs, I mean. Be careful."

"I will." 

There's a pause, and then Liam leans up to kiss him. "Want a pizza while I'm out?" he jokes lamely.

Brett tries to even muster a smile. "Think they're all bad by now." 

Liam shrugs. "I bet I could find one. Or someone who could find one." He sighs. "We're gonna hike up the road a bit. Find a working car. Use that."

"Okay. Good plan. Be careful. Please, for the love of God, don't do anything stupid."

"I won't. Can't talk for Scott, but I won't." 

"Alright." Scott's standing just past the RV, waiting for Liam. "Alright, I'll - see you when you get back?"

Liam nods, kisses him again, and turns to leave. 

Brett watches him go, and, once Liam's out of sight, feels his eyes overflow. He's crying and helpless to stop it - for the longest time, Liam's been his bright spot, his hope, his reason to keep going when everything else is transitional, unknown or gone.

His hope spot just left.


	18. Chapter Eighteen - Regression To The Mean

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is a little bit early, but this chapter is dedicated to **Melina_Vanilla** for their birthday! Thank you so much for your amazing continued support, I hope you have a great day  <3
> 
> This chapter is LONG. You might want a cup of tea. Or a beer or something. Enjoy!

**Chapter Eighteen - Regression To The Mean**

_Get to Ashburton._

_Raid the hospital._

_Find what you need._

_Get out._

Liam's mental checklist is deceptively simple; to be perfectly honest, he's anticipating trouble at literally every turn and that's a lot of them. 

Getting to Ashburton will be the easiest part. And even that's fraught with danger - they have to carefully navigate their chosen car through other broken-down ones, often going off the highway and into the embankments along the side of the road. Then they have to pass through one of three tunnels to actually get into the city.

After that, they're going to ditch the car - with the Keepers presumably still roaming about and the fucking one-thousand strong missing herd of zombies, the noise an engine will make is too dangerous. That means continuing on foot to the hospital, which, if they use the same tunnel Liam and Brett used to escape, is a week.

Liam's stomach rolls so violently he thinks, for a moment, that he might actually puke. They can't afford a week - which is why they're forgoing the tunnel they know, with some certainty, is safe, in favour of the one closer to Liam's old home.

The idea of being away from Brett for so long is making Liam sick for a few reasons, the first being that Brett's hurt and probably can't defend himself and Stiles from anything more than a few zombies. If people come along the highway while they're gone, or Brett ends up having to fight hand-to-hand, he's screwed. 

The second - Brett is safe. Gentle. Liam knows by now that Brett's only got his best interests at heart, that he'd do anything to keep Liam safe, and Liam feels the same way about Brett - and how they're supposed to do that when they're separated by whole herds of zombies, broken and overturned cars, highways, cannibals and possible death, he doesn't know. But he feels like he left half of himself behind on the highway and traded it for Scott. A trade that is nowhere close to being fair.

It's not that Scott's a bad guy. He isn't. But he's not Brett and Liam knows that his experience out in the open is limited - that he and Stiles have only been going out scouting for maybe two months now. That's not a lot of experience. Not the years that Liam has. 

It took him months to learn to rely on Brett. It took Brett months to become reliable enough for Liam to do it. Scott's not there yet. Liam's not sure he ever will be. 

"Did you really have to point that thing at me?" Scott asks, eyeing Liam's crossbow.

"Did you really have to lie about your friend working for the murderous slave traders?" Liam shoots back.

"He's not working with them," Scott says confidently. "He's probably just going along with whatever they're doing to survive. I already mentioned that."

"I don't believe you," Liam says flatly. "I can't believe you believe _yourself_ to be honest. He looks pretty fucking cozy with them." 

"He's a good actor," Scott says defensively. 

"You ever think about what he probably had to do to be let out of captivity?" Liam asks coldly. "Who he had to fuck or kill or bribe or beg?"

"It doesn't matter what he did," Scott says quietly. "He can come back from that."

"He can come back?" Liam snorts. "You don't come back once you've killed someone."

"Everyone can come back. And you don't know he's killed someone-"

"Yeah? He's probably eaten their food. Which is made of _people_ , by the way. I hate to break it to you, but even if he is just acting, your buddy's probably done some fucking questionable shit just to be the lapdog of the cannibalistic, psychopathic, paedophilic slave-traders." 

"How do you know they're slave traders? Or paedophilic?"

"Have you forgotten?" Liam demands. "I already told you and Stiles. They tried to rape me. They kidnapped Brett and were using him as bait to get to me so they could sell me into a sexual slave market, then turn him into fucking chowder or something. And I'm sure if they get their hands on me they'll try again." 

Scott at least has the good graces to look shaken at that. "Alright. Got it."

"That's who your buddy Theo is working for," Liam says coldly. "Now just fucking drive. The sooner we're there, the sooner we can almost die and get back." 

~*~

It's dark again by the time they reach one of Liam's safehouses.

It's too late to make it to his old haunt. But this is still close to the hospital, and stocked with enough food for a night or two. Liam didn't even think to raid them before he and Brett left - they were so focussed on getting out it didn't occur to them.

"What's our plan?" Scott asks as they settle in.

Liam shoots him a glare. "You don't have one?"

"Not really. Stiles is kind of the planner," Scott admits.

Liam bristles a little less at that; Brett usually comes up with their plans, so it's not like he can fault Scott for it. "We get in," Liam says, "back entrance. Same way Brett and I went last time. Find the storage rooms. Then we get out. Soon as possible."

"What about our friends?" Scott asks.

"Two of us can't help your friends," Liam groans. "If we get an opportunity, fine. But we don't know that they're alive and Stiles and Brett need us."

There's a long pause. Then Scott hands Liam some food and says, "He threatened me before we left. Said if I didn't bring you back in one piece we'd have a rough time getting home." 

Liam rolls his eyes to hide the fact that he feels pretty warm at the thought of Brett acting like that because of him. "Good to know his testosterone is working just fine." 

"He really likes you," Scott says.

_Yeah_ , Liam thinks. _One might guess that from the amount of times he's fucked me in the last month_. But he doesn't say any of that aloud; that's for him to know. He's not really sure what the appropriate response is here - he meets Scott's eyes to acknowledge him talking, and then looks away. 

"He saved your life, right?" Scott asks. "When you got stabbed?" 

"Yeah." Liam pokes at their little fire. "Yeah, I was pretty sick."

"As sick as Stiles?" Scott asks.

Liam looks up at him. He looks wrecked - tired, exhausted really, corners of his mouth downturned, breath still wheezy with asthma he's been fighting all day.

"Brett won't let him die," Liam says softly. "He'll do whatever he has to."

Scott nods. "But Stiles isn't you," he says. "He-"

"He won't let him die," Liam says firmly. "Dude, when I got stabbed, he carried me on his back for like a mile just to get me home safe. There are so many ways I could've kicked it. I didn't. And we weren't even - together, or whatever the fuck it is, then." 

Scott nods. 

"For the record," Liam says quietly, "if I don't come back, he won't let Stiles die. He might've told you otherwise, but he'd never do something like that. But if I do die, make sure you take him back to your group. He needs people."

"That's why you're doing all this, isn't it?" Scott asks. "Leaving here, finding Oakridge, putting up with us - it's all for him."

Liam sighs, then nods. 

"Does he know?"

"I hope not." 

"Why?"

"He'd just feel guilty." Liam shrugs. "I always liked being alone. Even before all this. I didn't like most people. If I went my whole life never seeing anyone other than Brett, I'd be fine with that. But Brett can't do that - he's not like me. He likes people. I mean, I don't dislike them, I just don't trust them. But Brett's different. He needs a group, something to do, something to work for." 

"We have that," Scott says. "Our community, I mean. We all have jobs. Things we're meant to do. There are kids even. Not many, but a few." 

"Are there any named Lori?" Liam asks.

Scott blinks. "No. Sorry. Friend of yours?" 

"Brett's little sister."

Scott's face softens. "I'm sorry."

Liam shrugs. "It was a long shot. He just never found out what happened to them, you know? I didn't either really. My dad's dead. But I never saw my mom or stepdad after Marshal Law failed." 

"I'm sorry," Scott says. "My mom and I have a house. In the community. You - you can stay with us. If you want. There's room."

Liam hesitates, looks down. "Hey," he says quietly, "is - I mean, assuming we're allowed to stay - is - are me and Brett going to... is it gonna cause problems? Us?"

Scott shakes his head. "Nah, man. There are other gay people. Some people might look at you a little different, but it won't be a problem."

Liam nods. He wants to ask if maybe he'd be allowed to stay with Brett, once they're in a community - but something stops him. He doesn't know if Brett wants that, doesn't know if Brett will still want him when they're under the scrutiny of others, and, apart from anything else, the idea of a community, being safe, is so far away it's almost like a dream. 

"I'm sorry Stiles was so hard on you about everything," Scott says. "He's like that with everyone. He feels bad for it."

"It doesn't matter." It really doesn't; Liam's stopped thinking about it entirely. "I get it. Sort of." 

Scott nods. "You're pretty smart for a seventeen year old," he says. "Bet you grew up fast, huh?"

"Had to. Had to adapt... change. Saw plenty of people go because they couldn't. I was always better off without people. You know, just focussing on getting up, scavenging, eating, sleeping."

"That's not living," Scott says.

"No. But I was surviving." 

Scott nods.

"We should sleep," Liam says. "Just for a few hours. Then we'll get moving."

"Alright. Night, Liam."

"Night." 

~*~

He sleeps fitfully, which he suspects is entirely due to the fact that he's back in the city where he's almost died three or four times.

There are ghosts here. Ghosts of entire time periods Liam doesn't remember, ghosts that sound an awful lot like that Keeper, whispering at him to hold still, ghosts that feel like the heavy, rancid weight of the guy on Liam's back.

He shakes intermittently through the night. His side hurts. Brett's not there. 

When the tinny sound of the alarm goes off, Liam closes his eyes and lets it ring out. Only when it restarts does he sit up, shivering, pop a Vicodin tablet, and wake Scott.   
"What were you dreaming about?" Scott asks.

"Nothing," Liam says tiredly. "Let's go."

~*~

Fourteen hours.

The time he's been away from Brett, that is - fourteen hours. And Liam's kind of losing it, just a little bit. 

What if Brett was hurt worse than he let on and now he's dying and Liam's not there? What if less-than-friendly people happened across the highway and Brett and Stiles are their prisoners, now, or worse, dead? What if Stiles has succumbed to his infection and all this is completely worthless? 

What if he never finds out because he doesn't make it back?

They make it to the hospital just as the sun is beginning to rise - the world is still blue and grey and black, muted by the residual cool of the night.

The moment Liam sees the back door, his body turns to ice; every instinct is shouting for him not to go in there, that there's something very, very wrong with this entire situation, but they've come this far and Liam can't let Scott go alone.

Liam starts to shake when they enter; the bodies that were here previously are gone now, and the floors are eerily clean and shiny. Someone's been here - someone who obviously didn't have to worry about food, water, or shelter. 

"Liam?" Scott asks gently.

Liam swallows; he knows he's moving into full-blown panic attack territory, and that if he doesn't calm down now, he's going to be bent over with graying vision, feeling like he's dying. He's had panic attacks before, but not for a while. 

"Give me a second," he croaks.

Scott looks around anxiously; Liam takes a deep breath, steadies himself, and says, "Alright."

"You sure?" Scott asks softly.

"Yeah. Now or never, right?" Liam takes another step, swallowing nervously. "Okay. The storage room is this way." 

Despite the missing bodies, there's a suspicious lack of activity around the area, and making it to the storeroom is a relatively easy process. It's not deep within the hospital; closer to the front than the middle or back. 

Liam takes out the list Brett wrote him and begins looking for everything they need. Scott's near the door. 

"If we have time," Scott whispers, "I wanna look for something."

"What, the fucking fountain of youth?" Liam hisses back. "It's bad enough we're here in the first place!"

"Liam, it could be important," Scott says pleadingly. "It could mean our community has an advantage over the Keepers we didn't before."

"Fine," Liam snaps. He finishes dumping what they need into the extra bag they brought. "Let's go then." 

They leave the storeroom and begin to venture deeper into the hospital; Liam's breath rushes anxiously through his veins, and he feels almost lightheaded with how scared he is. But he presses on, following Scott.

"Stop," he whispers.

Scott pauses. "Yeah?"

Liam strains his hearing; he can hear moans, faintly, ahead. "Biters," he says. "Be careful."

Scott nods, and they turn the corner.

There are four biters. Each is mounted on a pole sticking from the wall, impaled on them, kept in place by a clamp. Liam's vision tilts momentarily before straightening out; the clamps mean someone put those zombies there. 

"We should go," Scott says, and Liam hears it - the brief but unmistakeable rustling of cloth rubbing together. Clothes.

He turns, sees the guy from the photos aiming a gun at Scott. Long-barrelled and black, it has a silencer on it, and even as Liam calls out, the guy is pulling the trigger.

He moves instinctually, gets in the path, feels an impact in his upper chest, near his collarbone, surprisingly soft. He thought a gun that size would blow his head off, but he's still standing, and...

And the world's gone a little wobbly; he topples over, realising distantly that there's some sort of dart sticking out of him.

The guy stands over him, sneering. _Where's Scott?_ Liam wonders woozily. _Did he get hit?_

"Well, you're a new face," the guy says, and Liam's eyes slip closed. 

~*~

"Hey. Hey, are you alright?" 

Liam opens his eyes, slowly, feeling like the movement may as well be torture. 

He's so groggy he can't feel his hands or legs; the world swims. A few feet away from him, a girl is staring at him - she's Asian, he makes out that much, with just-past-shoulder length black hair and soft, gentle brown eyes. 

"Oh my God." Her eyes widen. "Hi, you're alive. I wasn't expecting that. Um, hey. Listen, it's all gonna be fine, okay? Do your hips hurt? How about your other joints? They usually go for the hips first, but maybe not for you - maybe because you're younger?" 

"Huh?" Liam asks groggily, rolling onto his back.

"No, no, don't lie on your back!" she says hurriedly. "You might get sick. Roll back onto your side. Yeah, good job! What's your name?" 

"Liam," he slurs.

"Hi, Liam," she says, and she smiles, even though it looks scared. "I'm Kira." 

_Those fuckers drugged me_ , Liam realises drowsily. _Hard_. 

"I really thought you were dead," Kira rambles nervously. "You've been out for hours. I've been trying to get you to wake up."

"Not dead," Liam says groggily.

"Yeah. That's great." She smiles again. "How're your hips?"

"What?" he mumbles.

"Do they hurt?"

"No," Liam says. "No, they don't." 

"Can you move much?" she asks. "The drug might be wearing off a little now if you're awake."

Liam tries, but he's helpless - and he can almost feel his consciousness slipping away from him, even as he vaguely remembers that he's got something important to do. That he's in this fucking hellhole for a reason.

"Scott," he mumbles. 

Kira's eyes widen. "Scott?" she asks. "Did you say Scott?"

"Where is he?" Liam mumbles weakly. "Gotta find him."

"Scott's here?" she asks. "Liam, where is he?"

"Was hoping you'd know," he mumbles. 

"He came with you?" she asks. "What about Stiles? He wouldn't go anywhere without Stiles."

"Hurt," Liam manages. "Stiles is hurt. 'S why we're here."

He hears noises, turns a little. He's lying on the floor, and he sees feet walk past, then stop.

"This one's awake," a voice says.

"No," Kira says. "No, don't hurt him. He's just a kid-"

"Sorry," the voice says nonchalantly as the door opens. Liam feels hands on his shoulders, dragging him upright. He sways, almost goes down, and the guy curses. "Fucking Sam," he mutters. "Drugged him way too hard. Look at him."

"He'll die if you take him now," Kira says, her voice breaking. "If you put him under he won't wake up."

"I guess we won't put him under, then," the guy says. "C'mon, you useless sack of shit. Walk." 

Liam gets his feet underneath him, sort of, and staggers along. He hears Kira calling out, resolves to go back for her when he manages to get himself free.

They walk for a few moments before entering one of the huge, echoing operating theatres. The guy holding him pretty much throws him to his knees; he sprawls onto them, barely managing to sit up.

"This is the one you picked?" a voice asks disbelievingly. "He looks half-dead, Josh." 

"He's fine," Josh says, and Liam tilts his head up to see Theo standing above him. "Sam gave him too much sedative." 

Theo turns to the corner of the room; a teenager, no older than Liam, is standing there, looking scared as all hell.

"Didn't we tell you not to damage the merchandise?" Theo asks. "Look at him. Barely conscious. He could have stopped breathing." 

Theo's fist swings, catches Liam in the nose, and sends him sprawling back onto the floor, dizzy with the impact and the sedative. His ears ring. Josh, above him, looks startled, nervous - almost afraid.

Theo makes a noise of disgust. "Can't even get off his back," he says. "Come here, Sam."

"Theo," Josh says quietly. "They're not gonna be happy about that. The blood-"

"I'm demonstrating," Theo says coldly. "Do you want to be next?"

Josh stays quiet. Liam turns his head.

There's a pair of eyes watching him from the wall. Liam blinks; there's a bed leaned up against it, and the eyes are peering through the slats - two pairs, now that Liam's looking properly, both brown. He recognises one pair as Scott's.

He turns his head away, determined not to give Scott and the other person away. Theo's leering over him, crouches down and puts a hand on Liam's chest. Liam recoils from the touch., but Theo grabs his chin, tilting his head.

"This one's pretty," he comments. "Blue eyes. Blonde hair - once we clean him down. Small, too. Yeah, the boss will really like him." 

"If you didn't break his nose," Josh mutters. 

"I didn't break it." Theo inspects him. "I just made it bleed a little." He stands up. "Sam, get over here."

Sam's above him suddenly. Liam blinks, swallows. There's blood running down the back of his throat from his nose. Sam looks scared; he might even be younger than Liam. 

"You see how sluggish he is?" Theo nudges Liam's side with his boot. "How he can't talk or anything? It's because you gave him too much fucking sedative. We can't take any bone marrow from him like this. Not unless he's awake, and the boss doesn't like it when they scream."

Bone marrow? Liam wonders hazily. 

"Sorry, Theo," Sam whispers. 

"Sorry doesn't fix anything." Theo nods at Liam. "Sit on him."

"What?"

"Sit on him." 

There's only a moment's hesitation before Sam sits on Liam's stomach. Liam whimpers as the movement compresses his previous injury; Sam looks alarmed.

"Theo-"

"Now put your hands around his neck."

Liam stares at Sam, trying to beg, with his eyes, for him not to do it. It must work, at least a little, because Sam hesitates, and then says, "No."

"What?"

"No. I don't like this, I don't agree with what we're doing here, you-"

It happens in a split second; Theo hauls Sam upright, pulls a knife out of the sheath at his side, and buries it in the kid's chest.

Sam bellows, and Theo lets the knife go - lets the kid fall to the ground, right next to Liam, blood flowing everywhere. Liam knows that's a mortal wound - there's no way Sam will survive that. He's whimpering as he writhes next to Liam, his hand on the hilt.

"Pull it out and you die faster," Theo says. "Is that really what you want?"

Liam rolls onto his side, managing to drag his body over to Sam's, and tries to stem the blood flow with his hands. Sam coughs, spitting blood everywhere, watching Liam.

"That's sweet," Theo mocks. 

"Theo," Josh murmurs. "What... we can't..."

"You don't obey the rules, you get made into an example," Theo says coldly. "They have a no-tolerance policy on insubordination, you-"

A gunshot rings out; Josh staggers forwards, hand on his arm, as Theo whirls around. But Scott's right there, followed by a tall girl dressed in scrubs, and he's got no chance as Scott slams his head against the wall, knocking him out.

"Hold on," Liam tells Sam, pressing down as hard as he can. "Hold on, okay?"

Sam opens his mouth to speak, but more blood flows out and he's choking in front of Liam's eyes, and Liam's not Brett, he has no medical training, he doesn't know what to do short of putting as much pressure on it as possible. 

"Where's Josh?" the girl asks suddenly.

"He probably ran," Scott says, turning in a circle - Liam can see now that the girl is the one with the gun. "He's going to let other people know we're here."

Sam jerks under Liam's hands, coughs once, and something goes out in his eyes - some light, spark, quietly dies, and he's still, his blood still pulsing out between Liam's fingers.

"Liam, we have to go," Scott says gently.

Liam swallows and lets Scott pull him upright. He's still wobbly from the sedative they gave him; Scott looks to the girl.

"Malia, can you help him?" he asks. "He can barely walk."

Malia's at his side in an instant, eyeing him distrustfully. "How do we know he didn't snitch?" 

"He wouldn't snitch," Scott says. "He's not like that." 

Liam swallows. "We can't leave," he croaks. "There's this girl back where they were keeping me, Kira, she-"

"Kira's alive?" Malia asks.

"She was trying to help me," Liam says shakily. "I was in the same cell as her. I think she's tied up." 

"Can you show us where?" Scott asks desperately.

"I think so."

"We need weapons," Malia says. "I know where they took your stuff - you go with him, find Kira, meet me at the exit, okay?" 

"No," Scott says hurriedly. "You're hurt. We need to stick together, even if it takes longer. We get Kira, get our stuff and go."

Malia doesn't bother arguing; she helps Liam stagger along as they follow Scott. Liam hopes his strength starts to come back faster; he can tell Malia's wounded, and he wants to be able to help her.

"Left," he says as they reach an intersection in the hospital.

Scott turns, and they're in a hallway filled with cages. Most are empty; he swallows.

"What the fuck is this?" he asks.

"They were keeping us in those until they realised we could talk that way," Malia says. "Which door, Liam?" 

"Up there," he says, jerking his head. 

Scott reaches the door and kicks it down in barely two blows, and they enter the room.

Kira looks up - Liam was right. Her hands and ankles are bound with plastic zip ties, bleeding because she's struggled, but she looks happy to see them.

"Scott," she says.

"Hi," he breathes, and Liam looks away, feeling like he's intruding on an intimate moment. "We're gonna get you out of here."

"How did you-"

"Liam showed us," Scott says, and Liam waves a little. "He remembered the way."

Kira smiles at him. "You're alright," she says. "I thought for sure - oh my God, you're bleeding! Your hands, they-"

"It's not my blood," Liam says quickly. 

Scott unties Kira. "Kira, get him out of here," he says, motioning at Liam. "Malia and I are gonna get our stuff. Liam, take her to the car, okay?"

"Got it," Liam says, stumbling a little as Malia hands him off to Kira. She's shorter than him, which is kind of a pleasant surprise. "How long was I out?" he asks Kira desperately. 

"Almost a whole day," she says.

Liam's head spins. That's - that's almost two days. Two days since they left. And it's going to be at least another before they get back. "Fuck," he moans. He doesn't want to think of Stiles, of how sick he probably is - if he's still alive - or of Brett, and how scared Brett probably is that he won't come back. 

What if something's happened while they were gone? Nothing's gone according to plan. Absolutely nothing. And they still have to get out of here somehow. Out of here and home, back to the RV, whatever. 

"It's okay," Kira says, supporting him and letting him steer her in the direction of the car. "We're out now, and that's good."

"Brett - Stiles - they're gonna be freaking, they-"

He sees a shadow, drags Kira into a dark room. They stay there, breath baited, until the footsteps - just two sets - pass them by.

"Okay," he breathes. "Let's go. Quieter this time."

~*~

Liam's not sure how they do it, but they manage to escape through the back entrance of the hospital, into the air. By that time, his legs are pretty much working again.

"That was too easy," Kira pants.

"Way too easy," he agrees. "C'mon, this way."

"You brought a car?"

"We had to move fast. It's noisy, but we couldn't come on foot." 

The car is two blocks away, parked behind an old pizza place. Liam grabs the keys from under the doormat of the place and unlocks it; they get inside, both in the back seat. 

"Now we wait," Kira breathes.

They're silent. Liam feels like they haven't quite made it yet, like they aren't safe right now - can't shake the feeling that something is going to go horribly wrong. More wrong than what it already was. 

They're only in the car for ten minutes when Scott and Malia come careening around the corner. Liam wonders why they're running - until he sees the background behind them moving.

"Fuck me," he breathes. That, right there, is a herd of zombies - a massive, ravenous herd of zombies, chasing Scott and Malia. "Oh, shi-"

Scott almost leaps into the driver's seat, and Malia's opening Liam's door; he barely scrambles over before she's inside, and Scott's throwing the car into drive and moving before the door is even shut, flooring it.

"What happened?" Kira asks.

"Theo released a bunch of zombies in a nearby building," Scott pants. "Liam, take this."

Liam takes the bag Scott hands to him and opens it; it's the medical stuff they need for Stiles. In the front seat is his crossbow, a katana - a fucking katana - and a few more bags, one that he doesn't recognise and two that he does. 

"You got my cross-"

Scott slams the brakes as they round the corner and come face to face with another herd; Kira screams with surprise, right in his ear, and he flinches.

"Scott, drive!" Malia yells.

Scott reverses - executing a nearly perfect three-point turn - and starts down a different road. "Which way, Liam?" he asks desperately.

"Turn right up there." He's trying to lead them back to one of his safehouses. "I'll get you as close to the tunnels as I can." 

He's half expecting to hear more zombies, but the roar of them fades as they drive, and Liam thinks they might be in the clear. He reaches into the front seat, grabbing the extra pack, and opens the top.

It's filled with paper. "What the fuck is this?" he asks.

"It's information," Scott says. He's wheezing - his asthma is getting bad from the running. "It's exactly what Stiles thought. Exactly where he thought it would be."

"Well good for him, but why do you need it?" Liam asks.

"It could have their plans in it," Kira says. "What they're doing and why." She stares at the pack. "We shouldn't open it here, though. When we're safe."

"Safe," Malia scoffs. 

They drive in silence for another ten minutes before Kira clears her throat and says, "We need to stop somewhere."

Liam's silent, even as she looks to him for support. "We need to stop and rest," Kira says again. "At least just to try and put some bandages on Malia."

"Then we need to drive further," Malia says flatly. "We can't stop here. Liam's right. That number of zombies just happening to turn up when we were trying to leave is weird. And we both know that Theo's bosses are probably collecting them for something-"

"They're weaponising them," Liam says, the realisation dawning on him slowly. "They're weaponising the zombies. That's why I haven't seen any for months."

"But you've been so far from here," Scott says.

"They must be - they must be searching really far," Liam says, knowing he's shaking. "Which means that there are way more fucking Keepers than I thought there were."   
"You've never had a run in with them?" Malia demands.

"They didn't know I was there," Liam says. "That's the only reason. Look, it doesn't matter - we go to the city limits, find somewhere to hole up for the rest of the night, then go. But we can't stay for any longer than that."

"Right," Scott says. "Any requests?"

"Drive faster," Malia says.

~*~

Liam's fourth wheeling.

They're in one of his safehouses, and Scott and Kira are patching Malia up. Liam's already built a little fire - a really little one - and doesn't have anything else to do. 

He sits down in the hallway, as far from the others as he can get, and puts his head in his hands. He's shaking so violently he vaguely wonders if it's dangerous for him. The world spins. He craves Brett's arms and hands and heart, but Brett's not here.

_Brett might not be there when you get back_. Panic threatens to engulf him when the thought strikes; he puts his head between his knees. He's been fighting this fucking panic attack off for the last day or so, ever since they left the highway, and he doesn't think he can postpone it again.

_You got out of there_. He swallows the nausea. _It's gonna be okay. You got out of there. You're not hurt. You escaped. Everything is okay._

_That kid was my age_. Liam's ears are ringing and the noise is getting louder and louder; he whimpers, covers them, forgetting entirely that there are three people just down the hall from him. _He was only a few months younger than me, maybe. And Theo-_

He can't stop thinking about it. The knife, going in, the way Sam tried to talk but kept coughing blood and the gurgling and he knew, he knew he was going to die even while Liam told him to hold on. He knew. Liam can't get it out of his fucking head - Sam, lying there, panting, fighting for his life because he refused to take Liam's.

_Scott and Stiles were friends with that guy. Theo. They were friends with him._

His chest is clenched; he can't breathe. He barely cares. _I wanna go home. I wanna go back to Brett._

He misses Brett so much he feels like he could fucking scream. Right now, his ego and pride be damned, if Brett was here, Liam would curl up and sob and let Brett hold him and try to soothe him. And he hasn't done anything like that since he was almost raped, but he's down to his last two percent and he can't do it anymore. He's exhausted and hungry and fucking terrified, and he can't see a way out of their situation. Can't see any light.

"Liam. Liam, can you hear me?" He feels hands on his shoulders. "Oh, Liam."

He remembers that Scott and Kira and Malia are here. The hands are small, soft - so is the voice. Not Scott. He's glad for that.

"It's gonna be okay, Liam," Kira says quietly. She's rubbing his shoulders - he's suddenly aware of a blanket around him. "Shh. Can - can you try and breathe with me? Can you lift your head at all?" 

He tries. God, he tries. He's had panic attacks so bad before that the hyperventilating makes him pass out - not an experience he's keen to repeat. He finds her eyes in the darkness and tries to focus on her hands, rubbing his shoulders and arms gently.

"That's it," she says encouragingly, smiling. "Can you try and breathe with me? In and out." 

His breath stops halfway the first few times, but after a couple of minutes, he's able to match her breathing, slow and even, and finally feels his head start to clear. 

"Thank you," he whispers miserably.

She hands him a bottle of water. He drinks obediently, even though he doesn't want to, as she settles in next to him, her arms still around him. "You're really brave, Liam," she says quietly. 

"No I'm not," he says. He's still catching his breath; he aches and feels weak. "I-"

"You held it together for so long back there," she says. "We're alive because of you. Doesn't matter if you break down afterwards as long as you keep it together during, you know what I mean?"

Liam nods tiredly.

"Listen," Kira says softly. "Scott's taking watch. But um - this is your place, and Mal and I, we don't want you to be uncomfortable. So - you wanna come sleep with us?"

"I don't wanna intrude." He tips his head sideways, closes his eyes, breathes in shakily. "I'll take the floor."

"No. Liam..." She pauses. "Do you have anyone to go back to?" she asks. "Family? Friends?" 

Liam thinks of Brett - of his dark blonde hair that's almost closer to brown, his smile, the shifting, living, breathing whorls of his tattoos, his eyes and the way they go soft whenever he looks at Liam. "Something like that."

"Girlfriend?" she guesses, and he shakes his head. She tilts hers, smiles, and then says softly, "Boyfriend?"

Liam nods.

"That's good. He's probably worried about you." He hasn't even realised, but she's rubbing his back in circles. "What's his name?"

"Brett."

"Brett and Liam. That's a good couple name. Brett sounds all hard but Liam's a softer name. Gentler. Is that what you're like?"

Liam shakes his head. "I'm really fucking moody," he says, voice cracking, but Kira smiles and almost laughs and that makes him feel a little better. "He's tall. Blonde." 

"Bet he's missing you."

"If he's still alive."

"He's still alive." Kira stands up and puts out both hands; after a moment's hesitation, Liam takes them and lets her pull him up. "Come on, Liam. It doesn't matter to us if you sleep with us. Plus, extra body warmth." 

She must've checked with Malia before asking Liam, because when he re-enters the living room, still feeling shaken and scared - like he hasn't quite finished coming down yet - all she does is offer him a small smile, like she's out of practice, and pull back the blankets next to her. 

Liam climbs in, putting his head down, and Kira joins him on his other side. "You'll get to see Brett tomorrow," she says.

"Maybe." He closes his eyes.

"Who's Brett?" Malia asks.

"My boyfriend. Sort of," Liam says sleepily.

"Huh. Okay." With that, she's rolling over and grabbing him around the waist, spooning him. "Do you mind this?"

"No," Liam says honestly, feeling pleasantly surprised. 

"Good. Sleep."

So he does.

~*~

They're famished and tired and thirsty, but they're on the way back to the highway.

Liam's in the back seat, squished up between Malia and Kira. He doesn't mind it very much; he's spent a lot of the drive dozing on Kira's shoulder. He hasn't meant to, and he's sort of embarrassed about it, but she doesn't seem to mind, and nobody's teasing him anyway.

They're through the tunnel by the time dawn breaks, and Liam thinks they might actually have made it. Despite his panic attack last night, he's feeling cautiously optimistic about this whole thing. 

He looks down. The bag of medical supplies they need for Stiles is between his feet; he hopes they've made it back on time.

It's about an hour later that they stop; the car needs more fuel, which they have in the boot. They all pile out even though it's a one man job, just to stretch and breathe in the air. Liam decides he's going to have a look at some of the other cars, try to find some loot. 

It's not long before he finds something of interest - a knife, lying on the backseat of a car, that looks like it's in good condition - sharp, at the very least. He tries to open the door, but the car is locked, so he looks for something he could open it with. 

He's just found a nice brick when he hears car tires.

He whips around - kind of worried that the others have just sort of forgotten him - but that's not it at all. The car door opens, and Theo's stepping out.

"Really?" he asks. "You thought that driving out to a highway would be far enough to lose us?"

Then he's producing a gun - Liam lunges forward, yelling a warning, but Theo's already fired. It's small luck that it's the same tranquiliser gun he used on Liam before, because the dart hits Malia in the shoulder, and it only takes seconds for her to topple.

_How did he track us? Has he followed us all night? What_ -

"Kira, get Malia out of here!" Scott's tackling Theo, getting into a fistfight, and the only thing Liam can think to do is bash the window with the brick.

It doesn't smash it, but it does the trick - cracks appear in the glass just as Scott bellows with pain, and Liam doesn't know what else to do so he sends his fist crashing through the glass, lacerating his arm in the process. He barely feels the pain; he has the knife now, so-

He turns around with the knife in hand, sees the gun aimed at him, and realises he heard it go off about a second ago. There's a dart in his back, near his ribs. He's already feeling woozy.

He winds his arm back and flings the knife, watching blurrily as it sinks clean into Theo's shoulder, leaving him crippled over with the pain. 

The last thing Liam sees is Kira knocking Theo out with the butt of a gun, and then his world goes blank. 

~*~

He wakes with a jolt, disoriented and confused, his arm stinging.

He reaches for it with his other arm, attempting to figure out what the damage is, before someone stops him and says,

"Hey, hey, don't touch that."

Liam looks around; Brett's sitting beside him. "Brett," he breathes.

Brett looks like he has composure for all of two second before his expression crumbles, and then he's leaning forward and scooping Liam's torso up into his arms, holding him tightly. Liam clings to him with his good arm, closing his eyes.

Home. The RV is shaking a little; they must be driving. Liam's lying on the couch, his arm spread out on a little table Brett's dragged closer. There's blood on it.

He closes his eyes. "It's been a really rough week," he says weakly.

Brett holds him for so long Liam loses track of time. He lets his eyes slip shut and stay that way, listening to the gentle beating of Brett's heart and inhaling his scent until he feels drowsy with it. For a moment, he wonders if he's dreaming - he can't possibly be back here, safe. They can't all still be alive. Stuff like that doesn't happen. But Brett's holding him and Liam's about to doze off and he can't be falling asleep unless he's already awake.

Brett pulls away from him. "Welcome back," he says, voice breaking in the middle.

Liam lets his head flop back onto the pillow; he feels kind of groggy. When he looks over at his arm, he notices that it's wrapped in clean white bandages.

"What happened to my arm?" he asks, confused.

"Don't you remember?" Brett asks hesitantly. "You were almost back when that guy - Theo - caught up to you all. You saw him coming I think. Kira said you smashed the window of a car in to get at a knife. Cut yourself up pretty good." 

"What'd I do with the knife?" Liam asks blankly.

"You threw it at him," Brett says. "Got him right in the shoulder. Kira thinks your aim would've been better, but he hit you with a tranq dart." Brett shakes his head. "You've been out for ages. He got Malia as well - she's still asleep."

"Who's driving?" Liam asks sleepily. 

"Kira," Brett says. "Here."

Liam sits up; Brett's got him covered in a blanket. "You did all this?"

"Yeah. Dug all the glass out of your arm. Theo kind of did me a favour there... you didn't move an inch." 

"Is it bad?" Liam asks hesitantly, not sure he wants to know the answer.

Brett shakes his head, handing Liam a bottle of water. "Nah. You've got a few stitches. Nothing serious at all." He nods. "Drink. You're pretty dehydrated."

Liam drinks, reluctantly at first, and then thirstily. As soon as he's done, his stomach growls; he's expecting Brett to laugh, but he doesn't. He just leans over and grabs some food from the tiny little dining table, handing it to him.

"How's Stiles?" Liam asks, sitting up a little better. "Did we get back in time?"

"I think so," Brett says, but he sounds unsure. "He got pretty bad. I don't think he's out of the woods yet. But we've got him on the drugs now, and we've debrided the wound again, and that's all we can really do." 

"Scott?" Liam asks.

"Had a dislocated shoulder. I put it back, but he's not going to be moving it much for a while."

"Kira? Malia?"

"Kira's fine. Malia's pretty weak - whatever they did to her in that place, it wasn't good. I'm gonna ask her when she's awake."

Liam reaches out hesitantly, touching Brett's ribcage. "You?" he asks softly. 

Brett finally smiles. "I'm fine now that you are," he says.

Liam nods, leaving his hand where it is. Brett shifts a little closer to him, slowly, and says, "I could use another kiss better, though. I missed you so much."

Liam leans up and kisses him, softly, on the mouth. Brett crowds in closer to him, a hand on the back of Liam's neck, his mouth slotted perfectly against Liam's lips. Liam closes his eyes, sighs, his hands on Brett's arms.

Brett curls over, flinches, and hisses. "Fuck," he groans. "Broken ribs suck." He stands up. "Move over a little."

Liam moves, and soon enough, Brett's lying behind him on the narrow couch, his arms tangled around Liam's shoulders and waist, pelvis pressing into Liam's. Liam drops his head onto Brett's bicep, feeling inexplicably sleepy.

He tries to fight it off for a while - the drowsiness, that is. But he soon realises that he's not sleepy from lack of rest; it feels unnatural, wrong.

"Stop fighting it," Brett says, and Liam jumps a little. "Go back to sleep. He hit you with a pretty powerful sedative. Next time you wake up, you'll be back to normal." 

Liam remembers, then, the kid - Sam - bleeding to death right underneath him. The cages lining the walls. Theo talking about how pretty he is. Mentions of bone marrow, of screaming, of a boss.

He rolls a little to look at Brett. "I don't think I can do this anymore," he says quietly.

Brett looks alarmed. "Do what? Liam-"

"I can't - I don't think I can keep running, and hiding, and barely making it," Liam admits. "I can't keep trying to save people and watching them die, being tired and getting hurt over and over... I just... can't." 

Brett nods. "We aren't," he says. "We aren't going to keep doing it. We'll die if we keep it up. We're going back to their community. Apparently it's fairly safe there. You can get your side fixed up, I can rest my ribs. We can sleep." 

Liam nods. But... "I don't know if I'm ever gonna forget half the stuff that happened back there," he says. "It... it's too much, it..."

"What happened?" Brett asks quietly.

"No," Liam says. "I'm not telling you that. You don't need to know." 

"You don't get to make that call," Brett says.

"Yes I do. I saw it. And I'd give anything to not have. I'm not - I'm not going to tell you something that's going to fucking traumatise you. You spend all your time looking after me, so how about you let me do the same? Just this once?" 

There's a long pause. Brett's looking at him like he's a vase and he's going to shatter into millions of tiny pieces at any given moment. Then, slowly, he nods. 

"Get some sleep," he says quietly. "We've got a long way to go."

~*~

A brief summary of their injuries:

Stiles' leg is infected. But he's got the drugs he needs now, and that's good. 

Scott's shoulder is giving him hell, but he's moving at least. 

Brett's ribs are busted. He can pretend all he wants that they aren't, but Liam knows he doesn't usually breathe that shallowly.

Malia's still weak from having her bone marrow extracted; she was, apparently, much hardier than Kira, and chosen for it more often. Kira's tired, and hungry, but she's recovering quickly, and she's fast becoming Liam's go-to person when he needs help. 

And Liam? Liam's fine. After sleeping off the rest of the sedative, he's bounced back to his feet and now him and Kira are the only two members of their little squad that are even remotely close to being healthy and functional human beings.

No pressure.

There's a unanimous decision made that they're going to return to Warranwood for a while. Stiles is out of immediate danger, and none of them are going to handle travel well in this state. Liam thinks it's a good plan; they know there aren't zombies there, that there's some food, that a lot of the houses are safe, even though he knows they'll end up in the same one.

He doesn't mind. If he's completely honest, he's kind of enjoying Kira's deliberate, gentle affection - and the way Malia is careless about hers, like she's not thinking about it when she ruffles Liam's hair or swings an arm around his neck. It means he doesn't have to think either. 

Now that he's up and moving - and feeling okay, really, which is a shock - his main priority is keeping Brett off his feet so his ribs have time to heal. He finds a pack of bandages in one of the supply bags they stole from the hospital in Ashburton, and he spends five minutes wrapping Brett's chest and ribs, knowing that keeping them still is important. He also knows not to wrap them too tightly. He learned that when he was eleven and his dad broke his. 

Brett's spot is on the tiny couch. At the moment, the bed has a rotation of members - Stiles is a permanent fixture, and has barely come out of the fever haze for long enough to drink water. Liam knows what that's like. Scott's spending a lot of time there too, resting his arm and shoulder and nursing his concussion.

Liam personally thinks that the level of attention Scott's lavishing on Stiles is a little beyond the realms of best friendship, but that's none of his business. 

He stays on the couch with Brett. Kira joins the bed every so often, and Malia sleeps in the passenger seat when she needs to - she tells Liam she likes being ready to fight. Liam likes her. She's fucking tough. They need that right now.

It's three days later that they arrive in Warranwood.

Kira's driving. Malia's sleeping in the passenger seat; Scott and Stiles are asleep in the bed. Liam's with Brett, playing Uno, when he notices Kira slowing down. 

He stands up and heads to the front, seeing the vaguely familiar streets ahead. "This is it," he says quietly. 

"Should I be watching out for anything?" Kira asks.

Liam shakes his head. "No. I'll give you directions there."

It isn't long before they're turning into the cul-de-sac, and Liam sees the little apartment ahead. It looks the same as when they left it. 

Kira stops the RV, letting out a shaky sigh. Liam sees tears coursing down her cheeks and stops what he's doing, briefly, to offer up whatever awkward words of comfort he can think of.

"We've stayed here before," he says quietly. "It's safe. There's - there's a mattress downstairs. We'll find some more. Stay together." 

She wipes her eyes, nods, swallows. Liam lingers for a moment, puts a hand on her shoulder. She clutches it.

They stay like that for a while. Brett hasn't moved, like he knows that Kira needs a moment to herself - or with Liam. She doesn't seem to mind him being here.

Eventually, she lets him go and stands up, sniffling. "We should make sure," she says. "Check it. In case-"

"I'll do it," Liam says. "It's not big. You wake everyone up." 

She offers him a wobbly, tired smile. "Thanks, Liam."

"No problem." He grabs his crossbow and machete, pulls on his boots, and stops briefly to kiss Brett on the way out.

The air is crisp and fresh, winter still lingering in it like a cool cloth after a fever's passed. Liam sighs deeply, then heads up the driveway, pushes the door open.

The fire pit is still there, along with the mattress and a lot of their blankets. They didn't have a lot of unnecessary supplies, but what they did leave behind is still here, untouched.

Liam checks the kitchen, first, then the laundry and downstairs bathroom. After that, he heads slowly up the stairs. The office is clear, the bedroom untouched - he barely ducks into the nursery, but it's much the same.

Safe. Safe. It's such a foreign concept he almost doesn't believe it - checks all the rooms again, twice, before he's convinced he can start bringing people inside.

He heads back out; Kira's sitting on the steps of the RV, waiting for him. 

"It's safe," he says. "C'mon. Let's get people inside." 

They take Stiles first - Scott and Brett can't help, but he, Malia and Kira manage to do it between them. Scott and Malia stay in there with him, and Liam goes back to help Brett as Kira starts bringing things in.

"Back here again," Brett says softly.

"Yeah." Liam walks slowly, at Brett's pace. "That's fine though. I'll set up some snares. Find some clothes for everyone. We'll be okay." 

"Are you alright to do that?" Brett's wincing; walking's painful for him with his injured leg, and Liam suspects he only held up as long as he did because he was convinced Liam needed him to. 

"I'm fine." He's telling the truth. "Besides, Kira can help me. Scott too once his shoulder's okay."

"He dislocated it. Might not be okay for a while."

"You need to breathe deeper," Liam says. "I know it hurts. But it'll make you sick if you keep breathing like that." 

Brett winces. "Yeah."

He helps Brett sit down on the couch and stays kneeling in front of him for a moment; he's worried about how hurt Brett seems, about the fact that it's his ribs, that his ribs are so close to his heart and lungs. "Want anything for the pain?" he asks quietly. "I think I've got Tylenol."

Brett smiles weakly. "You're the best."

Liam finds some Tylenol and water before standing up straight; Kira's paying attention to what he's doing now. "We should find some more mattresses," she says. "Everyone can lie down then."

Liam nods. "The other houses have some. We don't need to go that far." 

They make sure everyone else is okay before they leave - Kira's got a fucking awesome sword on her back, but she's also got a regular knife in her hand as they approach the other houses. 

They're silent as they clear the first one, making sure it's safe. Then, as they're lifting the mattress off the bed, Kira says, "So... how long have you and Brett...?"

Liam shrugs. "A couple of months, maybe."

She smiles. "He really likes you."

Liam blushes a little. "That's good. I like him too."

She doesn't laugh at him, which is nice. Instead, she says, "How old is he?"

Liam looks at her warily. "You're not gonna pull a Stiles and think he's molesting me if I tell you, right?" he asks.

She blinks. "No?"

"Oh. He's twenty one. I'm seventeen."

"Seventeen?" Her eyes widen. "You're so young." 

She doesn't say it like it's a bad thing; she says it like she feels sorry for him or something. Liam isn't quite sure what to do with that, so he says, "I'm almost eighteen," as a way of trying to placate her. If anything, it makes her look more sympathetic.

"We should do something for your birthday," she says.

He shakes his head. "Like what? Everyone's sick or hurt or both. Besides, Brett - Brett doesn't know it's soon and I don't want him to."

"Why not?" 

"Because he'll feel guilty for not knowing in the first place, on top of the busted ribs, jacked leg and plethora of other issues he's dealing with. My birthday doesn't need to be at the top of that list - especially considering it's only eighteen, and it's not like that's a big deal anymore."

Kira blinks. "I think that's the most I've ever heard you talk," she says.

They're approaching the front door of their apartment; Liam looks up at her. "Please don't say anything," he says quietly.

"Alright. I won't. But he's gonna find out."

"Not if no one tells him." Liam backs into the apartment slowly, making sure to check behind him, and says to Kira, "I reckon right next to the other one - can't have 'em too close to the fire." 

That's where they dump it in the end - a few feet from the fire. With Scott and Stiles situated on one mattress and Malia on the couch, Liam helps Brett move over to the mattress, saying, "Get your leg fixed up," before standing up.

Kira looks as tired as he feels, but she seems to gather herself as Liam looks at her and offers him a small, tired smile. "One more," she says encouragingly. 

"One more," he agrees tiredly, following her out. He knows that he can't blame the tranquiliser dart for how tired he is anymore - that was days ago - but he wishes he could. The stitches in his arm sting vaguely. Brett put fresh ointment and bandages down on them a while ago, in the RV, but the physical exertion is tugging them.

"Is that okay?" Kira asks, nodding at his arm. "We can stop if it hurts too much."

He smiles at her. "I'm okay. Thanks." 

He's just about to head up the stairs of the next apartment when she touches his shoulder gently. He turns around, startled when she moves closer and hugs him. 

Liam's not really a hugger. Wasn't before, isn't now - but this is nice, and she's holding him like she might a younger sibling, not at all how Brett holds him.

"Thanks for saving us," she says quietly.

"I didn't do much," he replies self-consciously.

"You took the hit for Scott." She steps back. "He told me. You saw the gun and stepped in front of it. Got hit with the tranquiliser dart instead of him - because you knew he had a better chance of finding everything than you did." She shakes her head, staring at him in wonderment. "You barely even know them."

"I nearly shanked him when I found out them and Theo were friends," Liam admits.

"I would have too. They're... Scott does what Stiles tells him, pretty much. He honestly thought it was the best thing." 

"I know he did." Liam starts stripping off the bed. "If I thought otherwise I wouldn't be here."

"But that has a lot to do with Brett, right?" she asks.

He pauses. Then, after a moment - he likes Kira and she seems to trust him and he wants to show her he at least wants to trust her in return - he says, "Everything does now." 

She smiles - it lights up her eyes. She's really pretty. Scott's lucky. "You two are good together."

Liam blushes furiously. "Thanks." As he lifts the end of the mattress down, he says, "What about you and Scott?"

"Oh." Her face drops. "We... I don't know. We were still together when Malia and I got taken but... it was rocky. Hanging by a thread, you know what I mean? So I'm not sure anymore. He seems happy I'm alive. But he's Scott. Of course he's happy I'm alive. We had a thing before, and it was great, and it even had a label, but now..."

Liam rests the mattress against the wall; this one is pretty fucking heavy, or maybe he's just exhausted. "And now you've seen how he looks at Stiles," Liam says quietly. "Haven't you?"

She looks up. "So I'm not crazy?"

"If you are, so am I," Liam admits. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be. Malia and I... something's different. But nice." 

"I figured," Liam says. "You went to her first."

"When?" Kira asks.

"When Theo chased us down on the highway. He dislocated Scott's shoulder and shot Malia but you went to her first, even though she wasn't badly hurt." Liam shrugs. "I figured."

"You're smart," Kira says.

"Nah. I just don't talk much. When you don't talk much, you notice stuff."

"Some people do no talking and no noticing," she says.

He chuckles. "That's true."

As they lift the mattress down the stairs, she says, "Why don't you want Brett to know about your birthday, Liam?"

Liam shrugs. "It's not important."

"It's important to him," she insists. " _You're_ important to him."

Liam feels himself go red again, but this time, he feels sad. "Yeah," he mumbles. "For now. I bet there's loads of pretty girls at your community. Or Oakridge. Or even other guys. I'm just important for now." Brett told him otherwise. But Liam's reality is this: he's seventeen and he knows that Brett wouldn't have looked twice before the apocalypse, or even if Liam had had an older companion when they met. 

"Liam," Kira murmurs, seeming surprised. "That's not true. He's not going to leave you for someone else."

"He might. I wouldn't blame him."

"You know," Kira says, "when I got you guys to the RV, Brett was waiting for us. He was aiming a gun at me because he thought we were looters. I knew it was him because you mentioned he was blonde and tall."

"Uh huh," Liam mumbles.

"I couldn't get you guys out of the car by myself, you know," Kira says. "I told him you were hurt. Your arm." She motions to it. "He looked - he looked like I'd told him the world was ending, again." She shakes her head. "He followed me to the car and he just freaked when he saw you. He kept asking me all these questions - he carried you into the RV."

Liam looks at her over the mattress. "He carried me?" he asks, blinking. "But his ribs-"

"When he saw you were hurt, it was like he couldn't even feel them," Kira says. "He didn't even seem to notice anything else. He just picked you up and carried you inside. He was so scared, Liam." 

Liam swallows thickly. He doesn't remember any of this - kind of wishes he could now. Although, Brett's panic probably would've made him panic, so maybe it's for the best.  
"Yeah," he says finally. "I've been hurt a lot the last few months. His nerves are probably fucking fried." 

"I bet he's glad you're okay now," Kira says encouragingly. It's like she wants him to keep that train of thought - that positivity. Liam's not sure why exactly.

"Yeah. Sort of. He keeps telling me to slow down. But uh, it's not like - I mean, nobody else is going anywhere. It's gotta be us, right?"

"Right," Kira murmurs. "For now at least."

Liam backs slowly into the apartment with the third mattress. "Reckon you can deal with this?" he asks Kira. "I got somethin' else to do."

"Sure."

With that, Liam goes outside and begins to string random bits of metal and trash together, stringing them up around the gate and door. If something walks into it, they'll know. It only takes him ten minutes, and it could give them an advantage they desperately need with four sick and injured members.

When he enters the room again, the fire's going and everyone is doing their own thing - Malia and Kira are sitting together, Scott's beginning to take inventory nearby Stiles, who's still unconscious.

Liam turns to Brett. He's dirty and tired looking, sitting with his chest and back deliberately straight to take pressure off his ribs. Liam takes his crossbow and weapons off, kicks off his shoes, and begins to rifle around in their packs for clothes.

He turns to Brett. "You wanna shower?" he asks quietly.

Brett nods, and Liam helps him stand, then supports him up the stairs. It takes them a while to get up there - Brett's wheezing almost as badly as Scott with his busted ribs - but once they do, Liam starts to help him out of his shirt.

"Last time we were both up there, this went differently," Brett says weakly.

Liam smiles. "Mm." He unbuckles Brett's belt. "At least we get to be clean."

"Someone should take watch," Brett says. "In case someone followed you guys out of Ashburton."

"I'm taking first watch," Liam says, feeling fucking fatigued just from the idea. "That way I can get out first thing in the morning and do some hunting."

"Liam, you must be exhausted," Brett murmurs.

"There's no one else," Liam says softly, reaching into the shower to turn it on. "Kira doesn't know how to hunt - Malia does but she's still not that strong yet. Scott can barely move his arm. Stiles, obviously, is not going anywhere, and you sound like you can barely breathe. Don't worry. I'm not on my last legs yet."

"I don't want you to get to that point," Brett says.

"I won't." _I survived Ashburton. I survived being stabbed. I survived Theo and watching Sam bleed to death. I survived the trip home thinking everyone would die. I can survive being tired, too_. "C'mon. It's not getting any warmer."

He gets in with Brett, washes all the grit and blood off his body, gets out, towels off, and then helps Brett out and towels him off too. His muscles hurt, but Brett's wheezing and looks uncomfortable. He can't bend down. 

_We're safe though_ , Liam thinks as he helps Brett step into pants. He feels kind of hazy and tired, but hey, they are alive. _We're okay._

He scratches absently at his ribs as he finishes getting dressed himself - he only put boxers on before helping Brett - and then they head downstairs. Liam's tired, but Kira's sleeping first, and then him, so he's rested before he has to go hunting.

Brett falls asleep with his head in Liam's lap, almost facedown, his arms wrapped around Liam's waist. Liam has to keep shaking himself awake over the course of the night, but he doesn't mind too much. The last time he slept willingly, he was curled up in a cold apartment in Ashburton, not sure if he'd make it back to Brett at all. 

He strokes Brett's hair idly until the watch tells him it's eleven at night. Then he has to get up - Brett grumbles - to wake Kira.

She opens her eyes slowly, but she sits up and goes to lean against the wall. "Can you wake me up just before the sun rises?" Liam asks her softly. "That's when the deer are out."

"Sure." She smiles sleepily. "Sleep well."

"Thanks." He knows he will; he's sighing with relief as he crawls into bed with Brett, who immediately pulls Liam's body to rest on top of his. Liam looks down at him; Brett's eyes are open, but drowsy, as he stares up at Liam.

Brett strokes his hair lightly. "My smart, brave, loyal boyfriend," he murmurs.

Liam smiles. His eyes feel hot. "I didn't think we'd be coming back."

"I knew you would," Brett murmurs sleepily. His hand is still petting Liam's hair; Liam doesn't want to tell him just how close they came to not making it out alive.

"I'm glad one of us did," he murmurs. "Go back to sleep."

"You first," Brett yawns.

Liam moves off Brett's chest, lying on his side beside him. "Alright," he mumbles, his eyes falling shut. "That can be arranged."

~*~

"Liam."

Liam blinks his eyes open groggily. Kira's leaning over him, shaking his shoulder.

"Hi," she says. "It's almost dawn."

He's never felt more exhausted, but he sits up, slowly, and murmurs, "Thanks, Kira. Uh - can you make sure Brett takes something for his ribs? He'll pretend he's fine, but he's not." 

"I will." She yawns. "How long do you think we can keep this up?"

"As long as we have to." Liam climbs out of bed and pulls his jeans on; Brett doesn't stir an inch. His face is pinched with pain, even in sleep; Liam decides to scavenge for more pain pills. Everyone could use them. 

"Be careful," Kira says.

"I will." He grabs his things and heads out the door, closing it quietly behind him and sighing as he steps into the cold morning air. It's nice to be outside again, to hear the quiet, but... everything just feels fucked up. Yeah, they're alive. But they're hurt and tired and hungry, and Liam can only solve one of those things.

The deer usually move at dawn and dusk, which is why he's out so early. They don't have a lot to work with when it comes to food - especially not for six people - so it's kind of urgent, at least today. 

He hears a groan behind him and turns.

There's a zombie - just one - shambling towards him. Without really thinking, he raises his crossbow and fires, shooting it right through the head.

He goes to retrieve the bolt and hesitates as he kneels down. The zombie has a blue bandana wrapped around its neck - a clear sign that it used to be a Keeper.

Liam frowns. "What the hell are you doing out this far?" he mutters to himself. "Nowhere near Ashburton..."

He doesn't take too long to contemplate it; he heads off again, stowing the information away for future reference, deciding that if he manages to snag a deer, he'll set some snares for rabbits and squirrels. 

He's in luck today, apparently - which is nice considering the week he's had. He heads to the park land near the police station and finds crushed grass, a sure sign that a deer has been through here recently.

It's drinking at the pond nearby when he finds it - it's a big one, too, fully grown, unlike a lot of the ones he's seen. He hopes they aren't hunting the deer population to extinction, but they've survived humans so far, right?

It only takes one bolt to bring down, piercing clean through its head. Liam feels wrecked with guilt every time he does something like this, but as he grabs it by the hind legs and starts dragging it away, back to the apartment, he thinks that he's just fed five people - five people who, at the moment, can't fend for themselves. And that feels good. 

It takes him forever to lug the damn thing back. He has to keep stopping, trying to avoid the pain in his side. He knows he can't let it get worse at the moment, not with everyone else relying on him being healthy enough to continue.

Eventually, he opens the door to the apartment; Brett, Scott, and Malia are awake, turning to face him as soon as he walks in.

He drags the deer over the doorstep, huffing with the effort. "Dinner's served," he says.

"Jesus Christ," Brett says, staring at the carcass. "That's huge."

"Yep. I know. I dragged it all the way back here." Liam sighs, dumping his crossbow and weapons. "Guess I'd better go skin it."

Malia stands. "I can do all that," she says. 

"Malia-"

"I might not be able to go out and hunt, but I can sit and skin something," she says stubbornly.

"Okay," Liam sighs, then flops down onto the mattress next to Brett. "Thanks."

Brett's hand lands on his back. "Hey," he says softly.

Liam tilts his face. "Hi," he replies, squinting drowsily. "How're your ribs?"

"They're feeling a little better. Kira got me to take something for them on your instruction," Brett says.

Liam yawns. "Good. How's Stiles?"

Brett hesitates; Liam sits up. "What's wrong?" he asks.

"He's not... doing as well as we'd hoped," Brett says. 

"Why not?" Liam looks over at Stiles, only now realising that Scott hasn't said anything, even though he's awake. Stiles looks pretty awful. "He's on the same drugs I was, what-"

"We need to debride the wound somehow," Brett says. "But I don't have the stuff I need."

Liam stands up. "Tell me what to get," he says. "I'll go now. I can be back before midday."

"Liam-"

"Look, we can save at least fifteen minutes if you don't tell me not to go, and I say I'm going to, and then you resort to begging, and I go anyway," Liam says, pulling on his jacket and the strap for his machete. "I'm going. You might as well save me time."

Brett rubs his face. "Okay," he says. "We need scalpels. Uh, surgical needles and thread too - disinfectant and bandages if you find any. Pain medication."

"Got it." Liam picks up his backpack. "Won't be dragging a deer this time, so I shouldn't be long."

"Liam..."

"We've come this far without losing anyone," Liam says shortly. "And today's not gonna be the day. See you soon." 

~*~

He almost enjoys the silence.

He's settled into having Kira and Malia around. But being with five people - all of whom are at least four years older than him, if not more - is wearing him thin, considering he's only just really adjusted to having Brett.

As he heads to the doctor's office, he makes note of a few clothing stores along the way. Everyone could use some new ones; he'll come back at some point while he checks the snares. But right now his main priority is the medical stuff.

As he goes, he begins to pick up bits of scrap. The discovery of that zombified Keeper has got him on edge, and he's got a few ideas for an alarm system outside the apartment. 

He finds the needles, scalpels, and thread with relative ease inside the storeroom at the doctor's clinic. Next door is the chemist - Liam has to work out how to break inside - which should have disinfectant and bandages. And, if he's lucky, pain medication.

The front part of the store has been looted, but Liam almost never checks the front part of a store anyway - he always goes to the storerooms and loading docks out the back. That's where he strikes gold; he finds packages of bandages, disinfectant, and even some Tylenol.

He sighs as he loads up his pack, popping a few Tylenol while he's at it - his side is beginning to hurt, and he knows he's in for a pretty rough day. Still, they should have everything they need now. At least for a while.

He stands up, turns around, and exits the storeroom - and hears a low, rumbling growl.

He freezes where he is; he's screwed if it's a wolf. If there's anything he's learned the last two years, it's that wherever there's a significant population of deer, there are usually plenty of wolves - wolves, which always travel in packs. He's seen entire groups of people hunted down and pinned by packs big enough. 

He turns sideways slowly - almost relieved to find it's just a dog. A German Shepherd by the looks of it, pathetically skinny, its ears back and hackles raised.

It's not a wolf pack, but it's still a pretty aggressive dog. Liam stands rigidly still, looking at it out of the corner of his eye.

It's got a collar, he realises as he looks at it. He swallows; he knows if he moves the dog is probably gonna jump him, and Liam doesn't have easy access to his knife right now. 

"Hey boy," he says slowly.

The growling settles a little.

"Yeah," Liam murmurs sadly. "You used to be someone's, huh? What happened to your family?" 

The dog, of course, doesn't answer, because it's a dog. It's not growling anymore, though. It can't have been alone for that long if it recognises human speech enough to be talked down from its aggression.

Liam moves a little; the dog's ears are still back, tail low, but it's not growling anymore, and it's stopped baring its teeth.

Slowly, carefully, Liam kneels down, opens his pack, and produces a package of rabbit meat. He hasn't seen a dog in ages, and this one reminds him of his - Meatball. This dog and Meatball look nothing alike, but Liam's always had sort of a soft spot for animals. Especially dogs.

"Here, buddy," he says, tossing a chunk of meat to the dog. It's gone so fast Liam barely registers; he throws another chunk out. "Yeah, you're hungry, huh?"

He edges a little closer when the next chunk of meat is gone, trying to see the dog's collar. It's not an old dog - if Liam were going to guess, he'd probably say it's barely an adult, maybe two or three. 

"Where's your family?" he asks it.

The dog tilts its head, beginning to nose at Liam's hand - the hand that was holding the meat. Liam laughs a little and gives it some more. They've got plenty of meat right now; he doesn't want this dog to die, at least not right now, when he can do something about it. 

"Gone?" Liam asks, sighing. "Yeah. Mine too." He gives it some more meat. "You gonna let me check your collar?"

The dog sits still as Liam reaches hesitantly for its collar, flipping the tag around.

**If lost, please return to Heather. PH: XXX-XXX-XXXX  
Excalibur.**

"Your name is Excalibur?" Liam asks. "Alright. That's a stupid name. Sorry, buddy." 

He sighs and stands up. "Well," he says. "I hope you do okay. Don't get munched on."

He starts to walk away, then hears the click of claws on the linoleum floor behind him. When he turns around, the dog - Excalibur, Jesus Christ - is watching him, ears forward.

Liam smiles ruefully. "Sorry, buddy. I don't know where your mom is."

Excalibur tilts his head. 

Liam sets his teeth and starts walking again, unsurprised to hear the claws again. He gets out of the chemist's and halfway across the road when Excalibur whines piteously. 

He turns around, looks at the dog, takes a few steps backwards. Excalibur follows - limping on his front right paw.

"Aw, fuck," Liam moans. "You're hurt, huh?" 

Excalibur whines again, sits down in the middle of the road. Liam sighs, then takes one of the bandage rolls out of his pocket and heads back to the dog. 

"These are meant for people," Liam says. "So don't fucking chew on it, okay?" As he reaches out, meaning to grasp the dog's leg to check the pads of its paws, Excalibur sits up straight and holds it out - a perfect imitation of a handshake.

"Someone really loved you," Liam murmurs as he checks the pads on the dog's paw. They're bleeding, cracked, dry; Liam flinches when he finds the culprit. It's a bit of glass, embedded right in the middle and upper half of the centre pad. It's not bleeding anymore; this happened a while ago. 

Liam hesitates, but the glass can't stay in there - the dog clearly can't walk very far on this paw.

"Okay," Liam says, and pulls it out swiftly.

Excalibur yelps with pain, sending a wave of regret and guilt crashing over Liam. "I'm sorry," he says, stroking the dog's ruff as he bandages the wound up. "There you go. You're good as new. Good luck, buddy."

He walks away.

Excalibur huffs behind him, gets up, and starts following him slowly, still limping, but able to walk. Liam sighs, turns back to him. The dog barks, once, questioningly.

"Brett's going to kill me," Liam sighs. "Okay. You can come. But I'm not calling you Excalibur. That's a fucking stupid name." He whistles.

Excalibur joins him, panting, tail wagging. Liam surveys him for a moment; the dog's dark, dark brown with a black mantle and intelligent brown eyes.

"Fudge," he decides. "From now on, you're Fudge." 

~*~

"You know, the irony of this hasn't escaped me," Liam says as he sets a snare. "First time I met Brett, I thought he was cute, so I gave him food and water and took him home. First time I meet you, I think you're cute, so I give you food and water, patch you up, and take you home."

He finishes with the snare. Fudge blinks at him.

"My point is that if Brett says anything about you being a stray, I'll point out that he is as well," Liam says. "Except he didn't growl at me the first time he met me. You can't do that to everyone else, by the way. You gotta be nice to everyone. We have a no-tolerance policy on bullying."

He wonders if Fudge wants him to shut up. But the dog's followed him the whole way back, trying to stay at his side even with his injured paw, so Liam guesses his mindless blathering can't be a bad thing. 

"Brett really is gonna kill me," he explains to Fudge as they keep moving - and fuck, Liam matches his pace to the dog's, for crying out loud. "You're another mouth to feed. But I reckon Scott and Kira will wanna keep you. Stiles doesn't get a vote because he's unconscious. And Malia likes me more than she likes Brett. So it'll really be a four-to-one vote."

Soon enough, they're back at the apartment; Liam hesitates before pushing the door open. "You gotta be good," he says sternly. 

Fudge wags his tail. 

"Exactly like that," Liam says. "They're nice. You'll like them."

From inside the apartment, he hears Brett say, "Who the fuck is he talking to?" 

"Remember," Liam whispers to Fudge, stroking his head. "You only get one chance at a first impression. Or something like that." With that, he pushes the door open.

"Hi," he says awkwardly.

They're all awake - except Stiles. "Hey, Liam," Brett says carefully. "You, uh, doing okay?"

Liam walks inside, holding the door open to let Fudge limp through. Brett's jaw drops.

"I found a dog," Liam explains sheepishly. 

"You found a dog," Brett says.

"He found me. At the chemist's. Uh, I got everything you need for Stiles." Liam takes his pack off. "Also, I didn't kidnap the dog, okay? He followed me."

Brett reaches out slowly, giving Fudge a chance to growl, but he doesn't; he lets Brett pat him. "He followed you?" he asks skeptically.

"Yeah," Liam says guiltily. "After I um, after I fed him. And gave him water. And bandaged his foot." 

"He's adorable," Kira says brightly. "What's his name?"

"Fudge," Liam says.

She looks at him. "His nametag says Excalibur," she says.

"That's a stupid name," Liam retorts. "So I renamed him. Fudge. He looks like fudge - like his colours and stuff."

"You've got a point there," Scott says. "But... Fudge? For a dog?"

"His last dog was named Meatball," Brett says. 

"Fudge is way worse than Excalibur," Malia pipes up.

"It is not!" Liam exclaims. "C'mon, don't make me ask if we can keep him, guys. Look how skinny he is. And he had glass in his paw. He got so sad when I tried to leave him behind." With that, he turns back to them, using the full force of the puppy eyes his mother used to scold him for. "You can't just toss him back outside."

"He is pretty cute," Brett says reluctantly. "But will he make too much noise? Be a distraction?"

"He's survived this long," Scott says. "I mean, if he's survived this long, he's gotta be a little zombie-smart, right?" 

At that moment, Fudge licks Kira's face. She laughs. 

"Alright, let's keep him," Brett says, and Liam brightens up. He was pretty scared they'd say no - and Liam would honestly probably cry if he had to put the poor dog outside in the cold, with no food or water, and know he was probably going to die out there. 

"Now that we've met Fudge," Brett says, "you reckon you can help with Stiles?"

"Yeah." Liam passes Brett his pack. "I found everything you needed. Even some Tylenol. What do you need me to do?"

"Hold him down," Brett says, and Liam looks up at him, alarmed. "This is gonna hurt like a bitch," Brett says ruefully. "I have to scrape all the dead tissue out of the wound. And he's going to fucking squirm." 

"Okay," Liam says hesitantly, joining Brett on the mattress. Stiles looks awful; he's completely white, shaking, covered in a thick layer of feverish sweat. "Is this gonna make me puke?"

"It might," Brett says. "Just don't puke on him. By the way - were you talking to Fudge the whole time you were at the door?"

"He knows what I'm saying," Liam says stubbornly. 

"Uh huh. And what were you saying?" Brett's peeling back the bandages on Stiles' thigh.

Liam's stomach lurches; he takes a deep breath and looks away.

"What were you saying, Liam?" Brett prompts.

"I was telling him to be good," Liam breathes, trying to quell his nausea. "And to behave himself so that everyone would like him." He swallows when he sees Brett hold up the scalpel. "I'm not good with this stuff," he says weakly. "I might pass out." 

"You didn't pass out bandaging Fudge's paw," Brett points out, giving Liam a soft smile.

"Fudge didn't scream in pain, or squirm," Liam says. "I only have to hold him down, right?"

"Right. I'll do the rest." 

Liam nods, deciding to focus on Brett's face and not Stiles' infected wound. "Is this going to help?" Scott asks. "Or will it hurt him more?"

"It's going to hurt," Brett says. "But we can't leave the infected flesh there, and - Liam, hey, I really need you to not pass out, okay? Just for a few more minutes."

Something about the word "flesh" has Liam's head spinning; he shakes it. "Okay," he says. "Let's just get it over and done with so I can pass out." 

"Is there anything we can do?" Malia asks.

"Uh - actually, yeah. Kira, can you go near his shoulders? Just be ready to help Liam out. He's gonna struggle."

"He doesn't look like he can struggle," Scott says.

"Yeah? Liam had a fever of over one hundred and four when I had to debride his stab wound, looked like he was barely breathing, and still nearly flung me halfway across the room when I touched it," Brett says sternly. "And Stiles is a lot bigger than Liam is."

"He's not that much bigger," Liam grumbles, and Kira chuckles a bit. "What? He isn't. Besides, I'm gonna grow more."

Kira looks like she's about to answer, smiling, when Brett sighs nervously and says, "Okay, ready?" 

Liam nods, bearing down on Stiles' leg. With that, Brett takes a deep breath and begins to scrape at the dead flesh.

Stiles' body immediately jerks against Liam's hold, and he howls with pain; Liam sees Scott moving and Fudge barks, once, but doesn't move from where Malia's holding him back by his collar.

"You gotta stop!" Scott says loudly, over Stiles' yelling.

"If I stop the infection gets worse and he dies," Brett snaps, still scraping using the scalpel. "Look, trust me, okay? Liam's still here and this is exactly what I did for him." 

Liam looks up at Brett, but Brett doesn't notice. He did this for me? Liam wonders - and yeah, he briefly remembers Brett mentioning it, but... he doesn't remember it happening, and the fact that Brett had to hold him down, listen to him scream, if Stiles' reaction is any indication of what happened-

"Alright," Brett breathes, pulling the scalpel back. His hands are shaking. "Okay, that's it. Done. Kira, stay here - Liam, I need you for a second."

Liam gets up and follows Brett upstairs - slash helps him, because Brett's wincing and moving slowly on his injured leg. 

"You had to do that for me?" he asks softly.

Brett looks at him. "Yeah. Uh, there's some needles and stuff in the cupboard. Can you get them?"

Liam climbs onto the counter and opens the cupboard doors. "How'd you do it?" he asks. "Stiles really struggled."

"So did you," Brett admits quietly. "Like hell. You thought I was trying to kill you. But I had to try, you know?"

Liam climbs down, handing the stuff Brett wanted to him. "Try?" he asks. "You didn't think it would work?"

"I wasn't sure," Brett admits. "You could've died anyway. But you were definitely going to if I hadn't done something and I wouldn't have been able to live with myself if I hadn't at least given it a shot. I dosed you up on morphine straight afterwards."

Liam licks his lips. "Thank you," he mumbles, feeling almost embarrassed.

"No problem." Brett offers him a wan smile. "Just - please don't ever get that sick again." 

Liam nods; he doesn't exactly plan on it. Apart from nearly dying, it took him so long to recover even half his strength, it's not an experience he's keen on repeating.

"Do you need any more help?" he asks.

"I might," Brett says. "Stay close just in case."

So Liam does. He wasn't lying when he said he'd follow Brett anywhere - and if that means he spends the rest of the night staring at a bloody, infected wound and trying to keep his food down, that's fine. 

It's not like Brett didn't do it for him.

~*~

_"Hold on."_

_There's blood flowing out between his fingers. Sam's twitching on the ground underneath him, blood spilling out of his mouth, choking to death on his own fluids._

_"Hold on, okay?"_

_He hears Theo laugh, and then he's kicked to the side. He rolls, manages to sit up, watches as Theo circles Sam._

_"You really think he can survive a wound this bad?" Theo asks._

_"Stop," Liam says, but Theo's putting his boot on the hilt of the knife and pressing down, and Sam's screaming, a horrible, muted, gurgling noise from the back of his throat._

_"Stop!" Liam yells, lunging forward._

_An arm catches him around the neck, and he hears a cough; there's weight baring down on him and he hears that Keeper say to him, softly, "Hold still, okay? I'm not going to kill you. Not just yet."_

_Liam squirms helplessly; he realises somewhere distantly that this is a dream, that these two events occurred months apart, but he's too deep into it to wake himself up._

_The Keeper's hand lands on Liam's stomach, hand splayed, and he laughs. "Scared little guy, aren't you?" he asks, and Liam sobs as he tries to wriggle away._

_"Stop," he begs Theo. "You're gonna kill him!"_

_"That's the plan, Liam," Theo says._

_The knife pushes deeper, Sam's chest is jerking like there's a current of electricity flowing through him, and the Keeper has successfully undone his own belt and Liam's, and Liam finds himself helpless as Theo stuffs a gag into his mouth._

_"It'll hurt less if you hold still," Theo says gently._

~*~

And Liam wakes up.

His breath is rattling in his lungs, and his cheeks are wet; he can feel the warmth of the fire, nearby, and the weight of Brett's arm draped across his waist.

Fudge whines; Liam rolls over to find the dog nestled into the blankets beside him. He noses Liam's face, then licks it gently, wriggling in closer to him. 

Liam breathes out, taking in the shapes of the others around him - Kira and Malia, curled up on top of each other and around each other like cats, and Stiles, on his back on the other mattress, and Scott, who's in the recliner beside him. He puts his arms over his head and tries to convince himself that it really was just a dream.

Except it wasn't, really. He was almost raped. Sam was stabbed and killed by Theo. And Liam was helpless both times. None of that was fiction; it happened. And he has to live with it somehow.

Liam hears Fudge whine. Then the dog's digging at the covers around Liam, bouncing his front paws off Liam's shoulder, nudging him. He whines again.

Brett stirs. "What're you doing?" he groans at Fudge. "What's wrong?"

Fudge whines and nudges Liam again. Brett rolls over onto his side. "Liam?" he asks quietly.

"I'm fine." Liam unfolds himself, gets out of bed, and heads up the stairs, trying not to disturb anyone. He's shaking and cold and feels almost weak, wonders briefly if he's getting sick. Then he realises the last few days are probably catching up with him.

The bathroom door opens. Fudge trots in, followed closely by Brett, who approaches him slowly - giving Liam time to say no, he doesn't want the company.

Liam doesn't. He strokes Fudge's head and lets Brett put a blanket around his shoulders.

"Can't just go wandering around in boxers and a t-shirt when it's this cold, Liam," he says quietly. "You'll catch your death." 

Liam smiles a little. "My mom used to say that." 

"Oh God," Brett groans. "I sound like someone's mother. Fantastic."

They sit in silent for a bit. Fudge puts his head on Liam's knee and looks up at him like he's expecting Liam to spill his guts to Brett - which maybe he is. Fudge is a smart dog. He can probably tell Liam's teetering on the cusp of a breakdown.

"When we were in the hospital," Liam says softly, "there was this kid there. I think he was working with Theo, but I don't... I don't think he wanted to. Theo was mad at him for giving me too much sedative - said that it damaged the goods and that they couldn't put me under without killing me."

Brett frowns. "Put you under?"

"Yeah. To get my bone marrow or something? I dunno. Anyway, he tried to make this kid choke me, I guess just to - to flex his power or whatever." Liam swallows; his eyes are filling up with tears, and then overflowing. He wipes at them impatiently.

"Liam..."

"He killed the poor guy, Brett. This kid - his name was Sam - he would've been younger than me, or at least not any older. He said no. Theo hauled him up and stuck a knife in him and just left him there. I tried to-"

Liam's throat closes over; Brett shuffles a little closer. Fudge whines unhappily.

"I tried to stop him bleeding out," Liam says shakily. "But there was so much blood, and the knife was right in the middle of his chest. It was everywhere. He bled to death within about two minutes." 

"Liam," Brett murmurs again. "It wasn't your fault. Theo... sounds like a dangerous guy."

"He's not done with us." Liam lets Brett wipe at his face gingerly. "I know he's not. He's got something personal with Scott, Brett. Me stabbing him in the shoulder probably didn't help much either."

Brett shakes his head. "Whatever his beef with Scott is," he says quietly, "once we're inside their community, we'll be safe."

"No we won't," Liam says. "Nowhere is safe anymore. And - Brett, I think - I think somehow they're herding the zombies in Ashburton."

Brett frowns. "They're what?"

"They're herding them. I dunno how they're doing it, but that's why we haven't seen any - they're all concentrated in one area. They must be taking them." Liam wipes his eyes and takes another breath. "I saw a zombie Keeper when I was out hunting for that deer," he says. "I think he probably turned trying to catch them here. Or maybe - maybe he was following us through. I'm not sure."

Brett readjusts; he's kneeling in front of Liam. "I don't wanna sound insensitive," he murmurs. "But you mentioned... something about bone marrow?"

Liam nods.

"What did you mean?"

"The reason Theo was so mad," Liam says. "It was because Sam used too much sedative on me - it made me so groggy I could barely walk. He talked about damaging the merchandise, said that I could've stopped breathing, and then said they couldn't get my bone marrow anymore because they couldn't put me under and the boss doesn't like it when they scream or something."

Brett nods along with him, like he's starting to understand. "They couldn't put you under because they couldn't safely give you any more drugs," he says. "That's why he was pissed. He wanted to harvest your bone marrow."

"So?" Liam asks. "People did that all the time pre-apocalypse, right?"

"Yeah, in controlled medical conditions with trained doctors, nurses, anaesthesia and pain medication," Brett says. "It's a little more complicated than they make it look. Taking bone marrow is pretty invasive - and painful without modern medicine. That's why they talked about putting you under." A sudden look of realisation dawns on Brett's face. "That's what they did to Malia," he says. "Why she's so weak."

"Why'd they want bone marrow?" Liam asks. "Did one of them have cancer?"

Brett shakes his head. "Cancer treatments are a thing of the past now," he says. "Bone marrow houses the body's most potent parts of the immune system. That's why they do bone marrow transfers to cancer patients - it essentially replaces the host's damaged immune system with a brand new one. They're looking for a cure."

"A cure? Wouldn't that be in our blood?"

"Not necessarily." Brett's chewing his lip thoughtfully. "I suppose if any part of our bodies was going to have an immune response to the bite... it would be the bone marrow. And some people are still infected with the airborne strain, not the bite-induced strain, so it would be possible that there are asymptomatic, healthy infected walking around."

"I don't understand," Liam says tiredly, feeling a little more upset about it than might be normal.

"That's okay. You don't have to." Brett stands up. "C'mon," he murmurs. "Let's go back to bed, okay?"

Liam follows him; Fudge pushes past them and gets to the stairs first, trotting down them quietly. Liam smiles.

"I missed having a dog."

"He's cute," Brett admits. "In a really obnoxious sort of way. Like you."

"Fuck you, Brett," Liam says, yawning as he crawls into bed.

"Maybe you'll get to when we have a spare moment to ourselves," Brett sighs, curling his body around Liam's. "For now I'll just dream." 

"So when I wake up and there's something digging into my back-"

"Just me, yeah."

Liam smiles; his eyes are shut, Brett's arms are warm around him, and he's safe. He feels Fudge lie at the end of their mattress.

"Go to sleep, baby," Brett mumbles drowsily. "I've got you."

Liam's throat closes over for a moment, and then he clears his throat enough to speak.

"You too."

~*~

When he wakes up, it's because Brett's dick is digging into the small of his back.

He grumbles, annoyed - although he's mostly annoyed because his own dick is responding fairly enthusiastically and he can't do anything about it when they're sharing with four other people. It's one thing to have sex in the upstairs bathroom with Scott and Stiles down here; it's another thing entirely to whack off with four people in the room, two of whom are girls.

He rolls over in Brett's arms with a sigh, tucking his face against Brett's neck and willing his cock to settle the fuck down. It refuses; it's pretty desperate for some friction. 

Brett mumbles something and reaches down, and Liam gasps as Brett pets him through his boxers. "Brett," he groans, trying not to let his hips roll forward. "C'mon, knock it off." 

"Huh?" Brett asks drowsily. "Oh. Sorry." He sighs, uses hi free arm to pull Liam closer by his shoulders, and puts his chin on Liam's head.

Liam closes his eyes. It's nice to feel safe and warm, like they might've actually made it this time around. He slings his leg over Brett's hip and sighs.

"If you get any closer you're going to absorb him."

Liam sits up so fast he almost flings Brett off the mattress; Stiles is watching them, eyes half-open, almost smiling.

"Stiles," he says.

Stiles shuts his eyes. "Not even the decency to go to the bathroom?" he croaks. "I'm not dead yet." 

Liam scrambles out of bed; Brett's still waking up. "Hi," he breathes, leaning over Stiles. "You're awake."

"I think." 

Fudge appears next to Liam, looking down at Stiles. Stiles stares right back.

"Or not. I might still be dreaming. Correct me if I'm wrong, but we didn't have a dog when we left here last."

"This is Fudge," Liam says. "I found him."

"Let me guess - you named him?"

Liam narrows his eyes, holding a bottle of water above Stiles' head. "Say one thing about his name and you'll die of thirst," he threatens.

Brett sits down next to Liam. "Hey, Stiles," he says, smiling. "Liam, go wake Scott up."

It's clear, from Scott's expression when he sees Stiles awake, that he didn't think it would happen. Brett nudges Liam to get his attention, motions outside.

Liam follows. He gets the point. Give them their moment and all that shit.

Brett puts an arm around Liam's shoulders. "We all made it," he says, sounding surprised.

"Hmm," Liam sighs, burrowing closer. 

Brett wrinkles his nose. "You smell like wet dog."

"So do you," Liam grumbles. "I'll go out and get us clothes tomorrow."

"Better get everyone's sizes first. Not everyone here is midget sized."

"Fuck you, Brett."

~*~

The next day finds him and Kira out with a shopping list of clothes and other stuff to find.

Clothes are sort of a luxury item, so they head to the chemist's first. They can get in the same way Liam did before; Fudge waits for them outside, lying with his head on his paws when Liam tells him to sit, then stay. He's well-trained. 

Kira's been quiet as they circle the store; Liam jumps the counter and heads to the back, where he knows there's still some Tylenol and other stuff. When he comes back out, Kira's standing in the prenatal aisle, holding a bottle of vitamins.

Liam tilts his head. She's been weird the whole time they've stayed here - kind of emotional, hungry, but picky with her food. Liam's caught her throwing up a few times too.

Seeing her standing there, at the rack of prenatal vitamins, makes something click for him; she's pregnant. He's suddenly nervous; he watched enough TV before to know that being alone with the pregnant woman in the apocalypse is never a good thing.

He approaches her quietly, coming to stand next to her; she barely seems to notice his presence. 

"How long?" Liam asks.

Kira jumps as she turns to him. "What?"

He nods at the vitamins in her hands. "Those are pregnancy vitamins," he says. "How long have you been pregnant?"

She looks stunned. "How - how did you-"

"You said that tinned food made you sick yesterday," he says. "But Brett and I ate from the same one. And everything makes me puke, so if it was just bad, I'd be sick too." He tilts his head. "That's why they weren't taking your bone marrow. If they were for someone else, you wouldn't be sneaking around."

She nods. "I think I'm about four months," she murmurs. "But you can't tell really. Not with all the layers of clothes and stuff."

"Is it Scott's?" he asks hesitantly.

"Yeah."

"He'll be a good dad." Liam starts tossing the vitamins in his pack. "Guess we'd better find some baby clothes while we're out here." He notices, then, that she's staring at him.   
"What?"

"Have you... you know. Told Brett?"

"No." Liam shrugs. "I wasn't sure. But I won't. Not if you don't want him or anyone else to know."

"Liam... it's not that I don't... Scott deserves to know. But we aren't even... and him and Stiles, whatever's going on, I don't want to wreck that for them."

Liam stands up, taking a few things out of her pack and putting them in his. "You don't have to tell him," he says. "I mean it's his kid. Even if you aren't together anymore. Stiles won't hate you for it or anything." 

Kira shakes her head, her lips wobbling, and Liam feels a surge of dread as tears start rolling down her cheeks. "Fuck," he says. "I'm sorry, it's none of my business-"

"I'm glad you know," she says, wiping her eyes. "I'm glad someone knows. I just don't know what to do, Liam. I don't. This isn't a world to raise a baby in. And what if something happens to me or Scott? Who'll look after the baby then?" 

"We will," Liam says, surprised. "If anything happened you and Scott, we'd take care of the kid. I mean, I'm not good with kids but Brett had a little sister. And Malia and Stiles would look after it too. What, you think we'd leave it behind or something?"

Her smile is wobbly, but it's there. "You're pretty sweet, Li. Liam."

"You can call me Li," he says, feeling sort of embarrassed. "And I'm not sweet."  
"Right. Teenage boys don't like being called sweet. Liam, you don't have to carry all that."

Liam hauls the bag onto his back. "Yeah I do. It's not even heavy. C'mon, let's go find some baby clothes or something. You can't just dress it in a blanket."

"I don't know what gender it is, though."

"So we get pink and blue. Or yellow and green. Those're gender neutral, right?"

She stares at him. "Gender neutral?"

"My mom was trying to have another kid before the shit hit the fan," Liam says defensively. "I learned some stuff. Like which colours are gender neutral."

Kira laughs and threads her arm through his. "Okay. Lead the way." 

They step out of the chemist's, Fudge starts wagging his tail as soon as they exit, bounding to Liam's side. Liam pats his head, then turns to Kira.

"So, seeing as I'm the first to know, can I name it?" he asks.

He sniggers at the brief look of horror she fails to repress. "Uh-"

"How about - how about Sunflower for a girl?" Before she can interrupt him, he keeps going. "Or - Sodapop! I read a book with a character named Sodapop-"

"Liam," she pleads.

"I'm only kidding. I wouldn't name a kid Sunflower or Sodapop. I'm not fucking cruel," he chuckles. 

"Oh, good," she sighs with relief. "Do you have any real suggestions?" 

He sobers a little. "Lori," he says quietly. "For a girl. Or... Mason for a boy."

She squeezes his arms. "Those are great names," she says. 

"Lori was Brett's sister. And Mason - Mason was my best friend. Before." 

She nods. "I'm sorry."

"It's alright. Maybe he's still out there somewhere," Liam says. "If he is I'll find him." He stops in front of the local Target. "Alright, make it fast," he sighs. "I hate shopping." 

"Noted," she laughs, and they enter, arms still linked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm really sorry if anyone has a dog named Excalibur


	19. Chapter Nineteen - Two Days Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> crawled out of author purgatory for long enough to say hey/how are you/thank you for being patient with me and this chapter! It was originally going to be like 25k so for my own sanity I cut it back to 17k and put the rest in a new chapter :P Enjoy!
> 
> Trigger warning for mentions of suicidal thoughts apply to this chapter. Be safe <3

**Chapter Nineteen - Two Days Out**

"So everyone's okay?"

Brett looks up. Stiles is up on his elbows, looking at Brett appraisingly. Brett's changing his bandages; the wound is still infected and looks sore, but Stiles seems out of the woods for the most part. Brett's sure they're all glad for that.

"Yeah," he says. "They're all fine."

They're all out, too. Kira and Liam are scouting together, and Malia and Scott are attempting to find more food. 

"Are you sure?" Stiles presses. "Nothing wrong with Liam?"

"He seems fine. Cranky, but he's not exactly getting a lot of sleep. And he's a teenager. Who was already sort of moody to begin with. Why?"

"Scott said when he got knocked out, the sun was just rising," Stiles says. "But he didn't show up in Kira's room until the sun was up. That leaves a good two or three hours unaccounted for."

Brett shrugs, aiming for nonchalance. "He seems fine, man. I dunno what else to tell you."

"It just can't be good news," Stiles grumbles. "Considering Theo was the one who had him."

Brett says nothing. Stiles had a thing with Theo, so he'd know him better than anyone, but... Brett's still reluctant to bring that up. He feels like they aren't strictly meant to know.  
"I'll ask him when he's back," Brett says. "But I feel like he's pretty sick of being questioned. Medically, at least."

"I know the feeling," Stiles says.

"Yeah, well, you're still not better," Brett says. "Him I just pathologically worry about. Someone has to."

"He seems like he can take care of himself."

"He can. It's just when other people are involved I get worried." Brett smooths the bandage down. "Done. You'll have to pull your weight around here soon."

"I might stay sick longer," Stiles says, feigning a cough.

"Do that, and Liam will be the first to strangle you," Brett says dryly.

~*~

_Three days._

_Three days of pacing, sitting with his head in his hands, and trying to keep Stiles' infection at bay with what little medical supplies he has._

_He's trying to stay positive and think that yes, Liam is definitely coming back, because he wouldn't not come back, because he's Liam and he knows how to fight tooth and nail for survival._

_But he's also with Scott, who, frankly, doesn't have nearly enough experience to pull shit like this off. So Brett's freaking a little._

_He stands up, starts pacing again. He's sure the floor beneath him is going to give out - maybe not before his leg does, though, which isn't happy about all the walking._

_"Come home," he whispers aloud, staring out the window. "Come home, Liam. You know where it is."_

_He stays there, staring, not even registering the car driving up until it's close. His heart leaps; he doesn't recognise it, and it's noisy as all hell._

_"Fuck," he swears, grabbing the closest shotgun and opening the door to the RV. He descends down the steps just as the car stops and the door opens, revealing an Asian girl getting out of the driver's seat._

_Brett raises the gun, shaking. He was hoping they'd get away with this, that no looters would show up-_

_The girl turns around, sees the gun, and immediately throws her hands up. "Are you Brett?" she calls desperately._

_Brett hesitates. Then, "Yeah?"_

_"Oh, okay, good," she says, and lowers her hands. "Look, you have to come with me - Liam's hurt."_

_Liam's hurt. His head spins; he doesn't even stop to think that it might be a trap before he's lowering the gun and heading towards her. Her face is open and honest - there's blood on her hands, too. Was she the one to hurt him? Or was she trying to patch him up?_

_When he reaches the car, he sees Scott unfolding himself from the passenger seat, arm and shoulder at an odd angle. "Scott," he says._

_"I'm fine," Scott breathes. "Liam's in the back."_

_Brett's moving to the back of the car then, mindless of his leg or ribs. Liam's slumped against the door, and when Brett opens it, he almost spills out onto the pavement - which is about when Brett realises that Liam's unconscious._

_"Oh, God," he murmurs, voice breaking - Liam's arm is bleeding, not profusely, but enough to warrant immediate attention. "What happened?" There's a cloth wrapped around Liam's forearm and elbow; he peels it back and, to his horror, sees shards of glass embedded in Liam's skin. "What-"_

_"He got shot with a tranquiliser gun," Scott says. "It's just his arm."_

_"Alright. Okay." Brett wipes his face; there's another girl in the backseat, and from what he can tell, the one who initially approached him is the only one who's able to move. "Um-"_

_"You should take him and stop the bleeding," she says. "And I'll stay here with Scott and Malia. I'll - is that your RV? I'll get them up there somehow."_

_"Alright," Brett breathes, hauling Liam into his arms, bridal-style, with barely a thought as to how his ribs might handle that. They give a brief throb of pain, but once he's straightened out, they stop hurting as much._

_Liam's head lolls back; his whole body is disturbingly lax. He's breathing, but slowly - more slowly than usual. Blood drips down his arm, seeping into the cracks in his palm and then sliding off his fingers, onto the pavement._

_"What happened?" Brett asks the other girl._

_"He got hit with a tranquiliser," she says, rushing along beside him._

_"I meant his arm, what-"_

_"He used it to smash in a car window." She looks upset. "He was trying to get to a knife. I think - I tried to stop the bleeding but I think there's still glass in there, I'm sorry, I don't have any medical training, I was supposed to start right before all this happened, and-"_

_"It's okay," Brett says. His heart is pounding. "What's your name?"_

_"Kira. You're Brett, right? You're Liam's boyfriend?"_

_"Yeah, that's me." He staggers up the steps of the RV and lays Liam down on the couch. "Drag that table and bag over for me?"_

_"What do you want me to do?" Kira asks shakily as she does._

_"Go get the other two," Brett says. "So I can look at them. I'm gonna get him patched up."_

_"Okay." She's gone in the next second; Brett thanks every God he knows of and then some that there's at least one healthy person available to help him as he turns back to Liam, spreading Liam's arm out over the table._

_"Alright, baby," he murmurs shakily. "Sorry if this stings."_

_He has to use forceps on Liam's arm to dig out the shards of glass still in it, and perhaps more disturbing than Liam screaming or wriggling or being in pain is the fact that Liam doesn't move a fucking inch - even his breathing stays the same._

_Brett shakes his head. "Must've been a heavy tranquiliser," he murmurs to himself as he pulls out the fifth - and last - shard of glass before disinfecting the wound, stitching up three of the bigger cuts, and then bandaging it._

_"Is he okay?" Kira asks - she's helping Scott inside._

_"He'll be fine." Brett pulls out a blanket and tosses it over Liam, leaving his arm out. "He's fucking freezing, though. Might be a side-effect of the sedative." He slips a pillow behind Liam's head - pauses, for a moment, when Kira and Scott aren't looking, to press a kiss into his hair. "Alright. Let's go get Malia."_

~*~

"It's fucking cold!"

Brett turns as the front door opens; Liam stomps through, looking miserable, dripping wet and carrying a few rabbits. Fudge bounds in after him and shakes.

"Ugh," Liam grumbles. "Seriously, dog?"

Fudge nudges one of the rabbits with his nose.

"Nope. These are ours." Liam strips his coat off and smiles at Brett. "Hi."

"Done grumbling?" Brett asks fondly.

"I'll stop complaining when it stops raining."

"Yeah, then you'll complain it's too hot," Scott says with a grin. Liam flips them both off as he heads upstairs to get changed into dry clothes.

Brett smiles a little. Another day, another scouting trip Liam's returned safely from. He hates not being able to have Liam's back out there, but his ribs are still giving him trouble.  
But Malia and Kira have been going out with him on rotation, and that's good. Neither of them seem too into the idea of letting a seventeen year old wander off on his own - and if Liam's a little frustrated that they treat him like a kid, he's not letting it show. He seems to sort of like the attention, almost.

Actually, at the moment, Kira and Malia are still out - Scott and Stiles are here. Stiles is sleeping, which is pretty normal, given that he's recovering from a bad infection. Scott was dozing when Liam entered, so Brett's hardly surprised to turn around and find him asleep. 

This is what they do. It's not ideal, to be sleeping on and off during the day and night, but they all need to rest. Liam and Kira are the only two people actually staying awake the whole day at the moment; they're out foraging the most, and usually, when they get back, they're exhausted enough to fall asleep. 

He follows Liam upstairs after a moment; when he walks in, Liam's just pulling on sweatpants, his chest bare and still slightly damp. He looks up when Brett enters.  
"I always know when it's you because you don't knock," he says.

Brett smiles. "Sorry."

Liam shrugs. "I didn't say I minded," he says with a little smile.

"Sure." Brett nods at his arm; the bandages are still on it. "Can I check those?"

Liam hops up to sit on the counter and holds his arm out. He's scratching idly at his upper ribcage again, right under his arm; Brett's kind of alarmed to see that the skin there is red and irritated. Liam's been scratching it hard, by the looks of it.

"Fudge give you fleas?" he asks.

"Fuck off," Liam says. Brett laughs, stripping the bandages from Liam's arm as he does, and peering at the stitches.

There's seven in total - three in one cut, two in each of the others. They're holding together and the skin is smooth, the same colour as the rest of Liam's skin - which is sort of a pale at the moment, with only a hint of the faint gold it had when they first met. 

"Looking good," Brett says, taking out the first aid kid and pulling out some new bandages. "They can come out in a week or so."

"That long?" Liam groans.

"Yeah. Sorry, buddy."

The door opens; Liam's about to jump down from the counter when Fudge enters, panting, and puts his paws up on Liam's knees. Liam laughs.

"He's your shadow, isn't he?" Brett asks.

"Might as well be," Liam says fondly, stroking Fudge's large, pointed ears. "Such a good dog." 

"He needs a bath," Brett says.

"We all need a bath. Like an actual one. With clean, filtered water." Liam sighs, looking up at Brett. "You reckon they have hot water back at River's End?"

River's End. The place Scott and his group have promised to take them - supposedly, a walled township that boasts protection from zombies. Some order. People. A community. Not Oakridge - not what Brett's looking for. But somewhere they can rest and get Liam medical attention for the wound on his side. 

"I'm not sure," he admits. "River's End having a hot water supply would completely depend on them having electricity. They might have generators... but those run out eventually."   
Liam nods. "Why do you think they haven't told us much?"

"They probably have to check us," Brett says. "When we get there. When we used to take new people in, we wouldn't tell them anything about the community until they'd been assessed - until we knew they were safe to trust with the information. They're probably doing the same for us."

Liam nods again. He's silent this time around, though.

Brett coaxes his arm up and probes at Liam's side. "How's this feeling?" he asks softly. "Be honest with me."

Liam sighs. "It's... it's been better," he admits reluctantly. "It's pretty sore. And, you know, pretty constantly, too, because - I'm not resting it. And I don't wanna keep taking pills for it either. It doesn't fix anything, and I'm worried that if I can't feel the pain, I'm gonna fuck it up worse."

Brett nods along thoughtfully; Liam's got a point there. "Hypothetically," he says slowly, and Liam narrows his eyes like he knows he isn't gonna like what Brett has to say, "if they could fix it with surgery... best case scenario being that you'd be completely pain free... would you do it?"

Liam hesitates. "Surgery?"

"Yeah."

Liam rubs the back of his neck. "That would keep me in bed for a bit, though, right?" he asks apprehensively. "You know, I'd be laid up and stuff?"

"Probably. I wouldn't know how long for though."

Liam licks his lips. "If they could guarantee it would work, and I'd be better, then I guess it would be worth it. But if there was no guarantee or they put a price on it I wouldn't." 

"And would you let me weigh in on your decision?" Brett asks.

"If you thought it was good for me and I didn't I'd probably just do it," Liam says softly. "You know better than me anyway."

_Note to self: be careful when Liam asks for your opinion. He'll count yours before his_ , Brett thinks. He smiles, leans forward, and kisses Liam gently.

"Well, let's hope we get a best-case scenario and they fix you up." 

Liam smiles back and nods. 

When they head downstairs, Liam promptly starts prepping the rabbits. He tells Brett there's enough dried meat that they could have some kind of hot meal, too.

Brett's mouth waters. They haven't eaten anything truly hot or fresh in a long time. For a while, he works on making some kind of stew as he watches Liam work, Fudge by his side.

Somehow, Liam's managed to gain some muscle back, even though he's spent almost all his time out hunting, scavenging and foraging - he lets Malia go out on her own, but he never lets Kira leave by herself, something that hasn't escaped Brett's notice. Out of all their new friends, Liam seems the most attached to Kira. 

It makes enough sense; she's definitely the most non-threatening out of any of them. But something feels strange about the way Liam's adamant she doesn't go out alone. Brett's never seen Liam take to anyone quite like this before - admittedly, he doesn't exactly have a large scope for measuring Liam's reactions to people, but still.

He looks up when the back door opens, and Liam enters, completely clean of any blood or viscera, Fudge trotting at his heels. The dog works out immediately that Brett's the one prepping the food, and makes a beeline for him, sitting down about two feet away and eyeing him hopefully.

"Don't be mean," Liam whines. "Give him some."

Brett throws Fudge a few chunks of meat, which are caught and devoured with enthusiasm. "Happy?" he asks Liam.

"I am now." Liam sits down and buries his fingers in Fudge's ruff, sticking his face out. Fudge leans forward and licks him, eliciting a cooing noise from Liam.

Brett shakes his head. Liam loves that dog more than anything else; Brett prays the dog really is as smart as they think it is and doesn't get eaten by a zombie. He doesn't even want to think about how devastated Liam will be if Fudge dies.

"Dinner?" Liam asks hopefully.

"Yeah, soon."

"I might go out and get Kira and Malia," Liam says, standing up. "They shouldn't be far. I think they were just checking the snares."

"Be safe," Brett says.

Fudge stands up when Liam does, but Liam turns back briefly and says, "Stay," to the dog, and "you too," to Brett before he leaves.

Fudge flops down onto the mattress with a huff.

"No need to be so depressed," Brett says. "I'm not that bad company." 

Then he realises he's doing the same thing Liam does - albeit with a lot less cooing and smiling - and stops talking. Still, he feels pretty bad - the dog looks like Liam abandoned him, for crying out loud.

"Here," Brett says, feeding Fudge a scrap of meat. "He'll be back. He's tough. Like overcooked steak."

It's not long before Fudge gets restless, though - stands up and paces near the door, whining unhappily. Brett would let him out, but Liam told him to stay, which means Liam wanted him here - and Fudge is sort of Liam's dog. 

Fudge's ears perk suddenly, and he dashes to the window near Scott and Stiles. His tail starts wagging.

When the front door opens, Kira and Malia only get cursory sniffs before Fudge is prancing around Liam's feet. Liam laughs.

"Did you miss me?"

"Your dog has separation anxiety," Brett says.

"Yeah, well, he's not the only one who needs therapy after this shitstorm," Liam says with a chuckle, coming in and sitting down. "Mal found some more rabbits. Thinks there's a warren nearby." 

Brett looks up at Malia. She's tougher than Scott and Stiles put together, and if anyone's gonna be out there with Liam, he's glad it's her. "How can you tell?" he asks.

"Their poop," she says simply. "There's more of it where there's more of them."

As soon as Liam sits down next to Brett - shivering a little from the cold - Fudge lies next to him and puts his head on Liam's thigh. Liam strokes his ears absently. "Is dinner ready?" he asks hopefully. 

"Almost," Brett says. "Guess we should wake up Scott and Stiles."

"Or we could eat it all and pretend we never had food in the first place," Malia says.

Brett and Kira stare at her, but Liam snickers, which makes her smile. "I'm only kidding."

They eat dinner mostly in silence. It's nice to have the company, though - Liam's warm against Brett's side, and Fudge is watching them both hopefully from Liam's lap. It doesn't seem to matter how much they feed the dog - he always wants some of what they have. Liam, who seems unable to say no, keeps sneaking the dog scraps out of his own bowl. Fudge is eating literally out of the palm of Liam's hand.

"They mind dogs at River's End?" Brett asks.

"Don't think so," Scott says. "As long as he doesn't hurt anyone."

"He doesn't look like he'd hurt a fly," Kira says. "He's sweet."

"Maybe not a fly," Stiles says dryly. "Just a few rabbits or game birds he manages to catch." 

"He won't have to do that," Liam says. "I'll feed him." 

Brett wonders what'll happen if they get to the point where there's only enough food for people - what Liam might do then. Share his food with the dog, probably, until it's not an option anymore. Still, maybe they can find some canned food somewhere. Save it in case.

He looks up from his dinner in time to see Kira putting her bowl aside, and Liam raising his eyebrows and looking pointedly at the pot of stew over the fire. She looks reluctant, but she fills it again, and Liam nods, satisfied.

Brett blinks. What? He could swear that that action was almost brotherly in nature, but he hasn't seen Liam act that way with the rest of them. 

Kira's smaller, Brett thinks. Maybe he feels like he has to protect her. 

Still. Strange. 

Later, when Liam's gone upstairs to rinse off, Brett follows him up. He shuts the door behind him.

Liam blinks at him. "Again with the not knocking."

"Sorry." Brett tilts head. "What's going on with Kira?"

Liam makes a vague spluttering noise. "What? I - no, nothing." 

"Wow," Brett says. "You're an awful liar." 

Liam looks up at him sheepishly. "I - it's not my business to tell," Liam says. "Sorry."

"Don't be sorry," Brett says, mystified. "That's okay. I've just been wondering why you're acting so... protective over her." 

"No reason," Liam says lamely.

Brett arches an eyebrow. "Right... okay." He motions at the door. "I'm gonna leave you to it," he says ruefully.

"Why?"

"If I stay in here and watch you shower I'm probably going to jump you," Brett says miserably. "It's been a while. I miss you."

Liam's face has gone all soft around the edges. "I miss you too," he murmurs. "Maybe... once we're in River's End..."

"Yeah. Maybe."

There's a scratch on the door, then a whine. Brett rolls his eyes and opens it to reveal Fudge, who's staring at them with his ears pricked.

"Seriously, dog?" Brett asks. "Even I'm not that attached."

Liam chuckles. "Get outta here," he says. "I'll be down soon."

"Alright," Brett says. "See you soon."

~*~

_Things are decidedly awkward in the RV._

_Brett hardly knows Kira and she's been talking nervously, at a mile a minute, for the last half hour. Malia's knocked out cold, Scott's resting - nursing a concussion and a dislocated shoulder Brett only just put back in place - and Stiles, well, still hasn't shown improvement._

_Liam's out too. He hasn't stirred, and that means Brett's been left to deal with Kira._

_"I didn't really think they'd take his bone marrow, you know? Because he's so young, you know, he's just a kid, but then when they came and got him, I thought they were going to kill him or - or sell him to Deus or-"_

_"Deus?"_

_"That's what he calls himself. Deus. Why?"_

_Brett turns to her; she's watching him anxiously. He hasn't left Liam's side since he's finished patching everyone else up. "Deus is Latin for God," Brett says dryly. "Good to know he doesn't think too highly of himself."_

_"How did you...?"_

_"My best friend took Latin as a subject. I picked up some stuff. Mostly how to insult people, but you get the idea. So, wait - sell him?"_

_"Yeah. Almost everyone who ends up in that room with Theo ends up dead or a slave. Liam's lucky."_

_Brett looks down at Liam, at the bandages on his arm. "Lucky? If what you said is true and he launched a knife into Theo - who sounds like a fucking psycho by the way - then I'd say his luck is probably pretty shit. I can't imagine Theo won't seek retribution or whatever."_

_"Yeah, he will," Kira says nervously._

_Brett grits his teeth. "Then I'll be ready when that happens."_

_Kira ends up going to the front to drive; they need to keep moving. Brett smooths a hand over Liam's face, pats his cheek gently to see what happens. Nothing._

_"Come on, baby," he pleads. "Wake up."_

~*~

The morning is freezing.

Brett draws his arms inside the covers, wincing when he hears Liam grumble unhappily. When he rolls, Liam's nestled up close to him, nosing a little at his shoulder. He's wearing Brett's t-shirt, which is loose and baggy around his chest and arms.

Brett strokes his hair gently, marvelling the way the strands slip between his fingers seamlessly. It's getting sort of long again - Liam seems to only cut it when it starts to fall into his eyes and it affects his hunting skills.

"Sorry, baby," he murmurs quietly.

Liam sighs, but doesn't wake. He was on watch last night, with Fudge, and he's probably only been sleeping a few hours, if that. 

Brett lifts the hem of Liam's shirt a bit, checking the wound on his side. It looks fine, and Liam's resting easily - he hasn't been pressing at it during the night. That's good.

The bandages on his arm can probably come off soon too. All in all, Liam's healing quickly - and once they get to River's End and his side is checked out, he'll be even better.

Brett's stomach growls, and he sits up, carefully, pulling his arm out from under Liam's neck. Liam shifts, but only a little, before settling again.

When he looks up, he spots Kira by the fire - she's making some oatmeal. "Morning," she whispers.

"Hi," Brett murmurs back. "Everything okay?"

"Pretty quiet." Kira looks behind him, to Liam, fondly. "He fell straight asleep. He must have been tired."

"He's always tired, not that that's unusual," Brett says, coming to join her near the fire. Liam rolls over and wraps his arm around Fudge, who's lying beside him. Fudge snorts.   
"I think I have competition," Brett says.

Kira giggles. "Not much," she says. "He really likes you."

Brett stares at Liam - the swoop of his eyelashes against his cheeks, the smattering of stubble becoming evident over his jaw, the solid lines of his arms and chest. Liam's a built little guy, really - naturally muscular, even now. Brett can't say he's complaining.

"Yeah," he says quietly. "He does."

"You like him too, right?" Kira questions.

"Of course." Brett shakes his head. "I wouldn't be alive without him. Or sane, even. Winter was... pretty rough. I think the only reason I made it through was because he was there with me."

Kira smiles. "Have you thought about River's End? What you'll do there?"

"What do you mean?"

"Housing and stuff. My dad is kind of the head of housing there - he allocates all the living spaces. Will you two live together?"

"We haven't really talked about it," Brett says, feeling confused. "They won't foster him?"

"No. They won't bother I don't think. Besides, he's almost eighteen."

Brett turns to look at her. "Almost eighteen?" he asks.

"And my dad could get you guys a really nice place," Kira rambles nervously. "You don't have to tell anyone about being together, but he could put you in a two-bedroom, see what happens or something."

"I'll have to ask him." Truthfully, he hasn't given a lot of thought to what they'll do once they reach River's End. Settle in, at least for a little while, he supposes - Liam can get the medical help he needs for his old injury, and Brett wants answers about what the fuck is going on in Ashburton's hospital. It's sure as shit not innocent.

"How're you doing?" he asks. "Okay?"

"I'm okay. Tired, like everyone else. But once we get to River's End we can rest."

Brett nods, looking around. "Scott and Malia?"

"Out scouting. It was meant to be Liam's shift... but they woke up first and he looked exhausted, so we left him alone."

Brett feels a surge of gratitude at that. "Thank you," he murmurs. "He needs it. I know we all do, but-"

"He's young," Kira finishes for him. "I didn't think... I wasn't sure how old he was when they brought him in, but I thought he was at least nineteen. He's just a kid."

"Yeah. Well, sort of. He knows way more about surviving than I do." Brett shakes his head. "You think he looks young now, wait until he shaves the stubble off." 

As he watches, Fudge's nose twitches, and he lifts his head.

"I swear," Brett mutters. "That dog's nose will mean our deaths by starvation."

Kira laughs, strokes Fudge as he wanders up to her and sits down, and gives him some food. "He's sweet. And Liam seems to love him."

"Yeah. I hope he doesn't get munched on." 

"Brett," Kira scolds.

"What? It's a genuine sentiment. Even if I wouldn't have to compete for my own boyfriend's affections anymore."

There's a groan from the bed; Liam rolls onto his stomach, cracks his eyes open, and blinks at them both blearily. 

"Morning, sleepyhead," Brett teases.

The glare Liam levels at him is pathetically weak; his hair is sticking up in every direction, clearly unused to soapy water being used on it, and his eyes are still half-lidded. Brett's shirt sags around his torso, showing his collarbones and some of his chest.

"You want some breakfast?" Brett asks.

Liam nods, shifts to the edge of the mattress - and flops down on Brett's pillow with a sigh.

"Liam?"

"Be there in a second," Liam mumbles. Brett thinks he's almost back asleep when Liam jerks, then moves, rolling over so he can reach his side and scratch furiously.

"Liam," Brett says, startled. "Knock it off. Jesus. Are you sure you don't have fleas?"

"I don't have fucking fleas," Liam snaps, and Brett reels. Liam usually only snaps - at Brett, at least - when he's sick. But he looks healthy right now. Well fed, even, despite all the work he's been putting into maintaining life inside the apartment. 

Kira looks at Brett, her eyes wide. Brett sighs, goes over to Liam, and sits on the mattress.

"Sorry," he says quietly, not comfortable with an argument becoming a spectacle for the others. "What's going on?"

"It's fucking sore," Liam grumbles, still scratching idly. Brett bats his hand away. "I dunno what I've done to it but it's a pain in the fucking ass." 

"Okay, okay," Brett says. "Leave it alone, alright? I'll find something cold to put on it. Should stop you from scratching at least." He wets a cloth with cold water and comes back over to Liam. "Here, let me see," he murmurs.

Liam lifts his shirt obediently; Fudge noses at his ribs, and Brett's amused to see Liam desperately fighting back a smile. He's ticklish. 

He's just smoothing the thin cloth - probably a strip off someone's t-shirt a while ago - down when he feels a raised bump under Liam's skin, and his own goes cold. That's not normal. He's touched Liam hundreds of times, in this very spot - Liam likes being held here - and there's never been a bump here before.

He pulls the cloth away, peering closer. He wonders, briefly, his heart pulsing with fear, if it could be a cyst or tumour - but the slight shape under Liam's skin is oblong. 

He raises his eyebrows. "Hold still," he murmurs to Liam. The area around the bump is inflamed and red - because Liam's been scratching it - but when he looks closer, he can see a tiny, tiny little cut, perfectly straight, right down the middle of the shape.

"Oh, shit," he breathes.

Liam turns to him. "What?" he asks.

"Lie down. Now. Shirt off." 

"Brett-"

"Just do it." He grabs the medkit; Kira and Stiles are paying attention to what they're doing now, even as Liam obeys what Brett's telling him to do. He looks worried, but not that scared.

"What's going on?" Kira asks timidly.

"Stiles was right," Brett says as he wipes the lump with antiseptic. "Three hours unaccounted for is never a good thing. Kira, can you help me with this?"

"I was right?" Stiles demands.

"Brett, what're you doing?" Liam asks timidly.

"Nothing. Hold still." He looks at Kira. "Hold him still," he murmurs. "Liam, I think - I think you've got an implant or something under your skin. I'm gonna get it out."

"An implant?" Liam barks.

"Yeah. You need to hold still, okay? It might hurt a bit." 

Liam holds still - Kira's holding his legs and hips, and as Brett presses with his scalpel, he feels Liam tense up underneath him, muscles wound impossibly tight. 

He cuts - only a small line, barely an inch - and uses the scalpel to push back the skin. 

He swallows. A small, oblong shape, black and silver, glitters back at him - the heart of it is pulsing red, indicating that it's on. Working. Transmitting something.

He grabs the forceps and, carefully, one hand on Liam's waist, clamps the implant and pulls it free of Liam's skin. 

Liam turns his head; he hasn't made a sound the whole time, but he looks fairly shaken. "What the fuck is that?" he breathes.

"A microchip," Brett says, stunned. "They implanted you with a microchip." He tosses it onto the floor. "Kira, smash it," he says, beginning to wipe up the blood on Liam's side. "Then come here. I have to check you and Malia next."

She nods as she stands up; Brett goes back to Liam, wincing when he sees the small cut he's made. "Sorry," he murmurs, stroking Liam's side.

"How did you know?" Liam asks, trying to turn to look at him. "That it was there I mean. How did you know?" 

Brett swallows. "Because you were scratching," he says. "I'm willing to bet that they put this in in a hurry. Your body was rejecting it. That's why it was itchy and painful." He shakes his head. "Thank God your body hates literally everything synthetic," he murmurs. "Otherwise we wouldn't have known." He's wiping the blood away gently. "Does that hurt?"

"It stings, kind of," Liam says.

"Yeah." Brett wipes his face. "Alright, you need a couple of stitches. Just to hold it shut. Hold still for me again." 

Liam's a good patient for Brett, sitting still and gritting his teeth as Brett disinfects the wound, stitches it, and dresses it. Kira's smashed the implant and is waiting, looking nervous.

"Why would they put one in Kira too?" Liam asks, sitting up and wincing.

"In case she escaped," Stiles says quietly. "I bet they all have them. Even the people who work there." 

Brett pats Liam's back as he moves off the bed. "You okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. Thanks." 

Brett turns to Kira. "Okay, uh... how do you wanna do this?" he asks awkwardly.

He doesn't fail to spot the anxious look Liam shoots her. "You can't just ask her to take her shirt off," Liam snaps. "She's a girl."

Brett raises his eyebrows; he's not sure what the fuck has gotten into Liam the last week or so, but it's odd at any rate. "I wasn't going to," he says softly.

Liam, looking sufficiently embarrassed, ducks his head and mumbles, "Sorry." 

"I'll take my shirt off," Kira says. "Um, Brett, I - I'm pregnant, so could you be careful? Please? I don't wanna hurt the baby."

Fuck, Brett thinks, staring at her blankly. _That's why Liam's been so fucking weird - he knew, somehow. He's been covering for her._

"I'll be careful," he says quietly. "I promise. Lie down."

Kira takes her shirt off for Brett, and Brett can see the raised lump under her skin straight away. He has to get Liam to help him hold her down - and Kira squirms, but only a little, and only because her implant is further down than Liam's was. 

"Malia's gonna have one too," Liam says.

"Yeah. We need them to get back from the scouting trip. And we should check Scott too, just in case." Brett bandages the area on Kira's ribs gently. "You okay, Kira?"

"I'm okay. Thanks, Brett." She sits up and pulls a shirt on; Liam's avoiding Brett's eyes. "Don't be mad at Liam. I asked him not to tell anyone."

"I'm not mad at you," Brett says, directly to Liam. "I'm proud of you."

"For what?" Liam mumbles uncomfortably.

"Looking out for her." 

Liam finally meets his eyes, seems to realise he's serious, and smiles a little bit. "Better," Brett says decisively. "Okay, look, if these are tracking chips, we need to leave as soon as possible. They're going to notice them going offline. Kira, I'm not gonna bust yours - one of them going off is believable, but not three at once."

"Okay. So what do we do?"

"We're going to pack everything up," Brett says, "remove Malia's implant when her and Scott get back, and then we're getting the fuck out of here." 

~*~

Malia does have an implant.

She's better at holding still than Kira, but Malia's is much higher up, closer to her armpit, and that makes it more painful. Still, Brett gets it out and puts it with Kira's, ready to be destroyed before they leave.

Before they go, Brett checks everyone again - even Liam, Kira and Malia, who could have more than one implant, and Scott and Stiles. Neither of them have one, which Brett supposes is good - he's not too enthused about having to bust someone open again today.

Once they've ascertained that nobody else has an implant, Brett stands up. "We should get going," he says. "Get out of here as fast as we can. As soon as they realise they've gone offline, they're going to come looking." 

"You think they'd kill us?" Scott asks.

"I know they'd kill him," Brett says to Scott quietly, gesturing at Liam. "After what he did to Theo?" 

Scott nods. "I'll take the first turn driving," he offers. "How'd you figure it out?"

"It was Liam." Brett shakes his head. "He's been scratching this one spot on his ribs for a couple of days now. Couldn't get him to stop. I was trying to put something cold on it when I noticed."

Brett rubs his face shakily, looking at Scott. "We wouldn't have known," he says. "If it hadn't been for Liam's body rejecting the implant - because his body rejects fucking everything you put in it, for crying out loud - we wouldn't have known the implants were even there." 

Scott nods. "But they're out now," he says. "Right?"

"Right." Brett looks over to where Liam's hauling his pack up, wincing at the movement. "So now we know why they left him alone. They wanted to see where we'd come back to - if we stuck together. Maybe they thought we had a community."

Scott nods. "Or they thought we'd take you back to ours. And they were right." He gestures. "Are you okay? I'm gonna help Stiles."

"I'm fine." 

Almost as soon as Scott disappears, Liam is standing next to him. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you," he mumbles guiltily.

"You did the right thing," Brett assures him. "She didn't want people to know. How did you figure it out?"

"She was looking at prenatal vitamins when we went out," Liam says. "They weren't for anyone else. Lots of other stuff too, but you get the idea."

"Yeah. You're smart."

"Just observant." Liam adjusts his pack, wincing. "I'd love it if people stopped trying to torture and kill us."

"Me too," Brett murmurs. "C'mon. Get into the RV. We're leaving now."

"What're you doing?" Liam asks.

"I'm gonna go smash those fucking implants."

~*~

_Considering just how hard Liam was sedated, Brett isn't expecting him to wake with a startled jolt and reach immediately for his injured arm._

_"Hey, hey," he says hurriedly, reaching out to stop Liam from messing with the bandages. "Don't touch that."_

_Liam turns his head - he seems confused, but not necessarily disoriented. "Brett?" he asks._

_Brett's not a crier, not really - not someone who loses his composure. But fuck, he's not sure anyone would be able to keep it if they had Liam staring up at them like this, okay and alive and breathing. It's more than Brett dared to hope for._

_He bends over and scoops Liam up into his arms. Liam, to his credit, clings to him with his good arm - letting his injured one curl somewhere between their bodies. Brett tries not to cry. Liam's hair is sticking up in every direction, staticky from the pillow, and he's fiercely warm from the blanket that's been thrown over him. He smells like sleep, like warm clothes, and most importantly, like himself. Like Liam._

_"It's been a really rough week," Liam mumbles into his shoulder._

_Brett loses track of time, holding Liam like that. He pays attention to every one of Liam's breaths - enough to notice when they start to become softer, sleepier, further apart. Liam's dozing off, right there, in his arms. That's when he realises that Liam's still probably feeling the effects of the tranquiliser. Of course he is. Any amount of sedative powerful enough to knock a grown man out was going to be twice as effective for Liam, who's kind of small and probably always will be._

_Brett wants to hold Liam like this forever, but his ribs can't handle the pressure; he pulls away, slowly, giving Liam time to support himself. Once Brett's sitting upright again, he clears his throat and says, "Welcome back," pretending that his voice doesn't crack._

_Liam puts his head back on the pillow like he physically can't be bothered keeping it upright; his eyes are soft around the corners, and Brett knows he's still probably sleepy from whatever was in the tranquiliser dart. He watches as Liam's eyes flicker to his arm, then back up._

_"What happened to my arm?"_

_Bret readjusts. "Don't you remember?" he asks slowly. "You were back when that guy - Theo - caught up to you all. You saw him coming I think. Kira said you smashed the window of a car in to get at a knife." Brett gestures to Liam's arm. "Cut yourself up pretty good."_

_"What'd I do with the knife?"_

_Fuck, he doesn't remember any of it, Brett realises, taking in the blank expression on Liam's face. "You threw it at him. Got him right in the shoulder. Kira thinks your aim would've been better, but he hit you with a tranq dart." Brett shakes his head. "You've been out for ages. He got Malia as well - she's still asleep."_

_Liam readjusts his head, tilting it. He blinks, once, slowly. "Who's driving?" he murmurs drowsily._

_"Kira," Brett says. He wants to let Liam sleep, but Liam's been out for so long now that he probably needs water pretty badly. He slips a hand under Liam's shoulder to coax him into a sitting position. "Here."_

_The blanket falls off Liam as he sits up, properly, then leans against the wall that houses the little couch. "You did all this?" he asks._

_"Yeah. Dug all the glass out of your arm." Brett eyes the bandages; they look clean, no signs of pinkness showing through. No bleeding - that's good. "Theo kind of did me a favour there... you didn't move an inch."_

_Liam meets his eyes; he seems worried, or as worried as he can be while still groggy from the sedative. "Is it bad?" he asks._

_Brett finds a bottle of water. "Nah. You've got a few stitches. Nothing serious at all." He uncaps the water bottle and gives it to Liam, who takes it reluctantly. "Drink. You're pretty dehydrated."_

_Liam looks like he wants to say no, and for a moment, Brett wonders if maybe the tranq dart made him nauseous as well as tired - but then Liam drinks and seems to want to continue, draining almost half the bottle in the process. Brett almost sighs with relief._

_He's opening his mouth to say something when Liam's stomach growls loudly; something akin to pain zips through Brett's body at the sound. Liam must be absolutely fucking starving - from what Kira told him, Liam's spent the majority of the last two days knocked out, which means he probably hasn't eaten anything._

_He hands Liam some food from the dining table; Liam sits up a little better and digs into it with gusto. "How's Stiles?" he asks. "Did we get back in time?"_

_Brett hesitates. Stiles' fever is still through the roof and the drugs seem to have barely impacted it, but he is improving very slightly. "I think so. He got pretty bad. I don't think he's out of the woods yet. But we've got him on the drugs now, and we've debrided the wound again, and that's all we can really do."_

_"Scott?" Liam asks._

_"Had a dislocated shoulder. I put it back." Brett shudders at the memory. "But he's not going to be moving it much for a while."_

_"Kira? Malia?"_

_"Kira's fine. Malia's pretty weak." There are wounds on her hips and shoulders, and she's moving gingerly, tiredly, like her whole body hurts. "Whatever they did to her in that place, it wasn't good. I'm gonna ask her when she's awake."_

_Brett's surprised when Liam forgoes his next bite of food to reach out, his fingers and hand skimming the lines of Brett's ribcage. "You?" he asks worriedly, his eyes meeting Brett's._

_Brett feels himself smile, almost unwillingly. Liam's sitting up, eating and drinking, perfectly coherent, and relatively uninjured. It's more than he could've hoped for - more than he thought would happen when he carried Liam in here. "I'm fine now that you are," he says honestly. "I could use another kiss better, though. I missed you so much." And that last part wasn't even meant to come out, but he's still glad he said it, because Liam's eyes light up with happiness as he leans up and kisses Brett, gently, on the mouth._

_Brett sighs, moves a little closer to facilitate, holds the back of Liam's neck where he's warm and soft and unscarred. Liam tastes like rabbit meat, but Brett doesn't care. Liam's hands are on his arms and he's sighing softly and contentedly, and Brett wouldn't trade it for anything._

_He moves, and his ribs throb with pain; Brett draws in a startled breath at the sensation. "Fuck," he mutters. "Broken ribs suck." He stands up - Liam watches him attentively, probably assessing his movement - and says, "Move over."_

_He situates himself behind Liam, holding him, revelling in the feeling of Liam's stomach rising and falling with his breath - smiling a bit when Liam lets his head rest tiredly on Brett's bicep. Brett doesn't say anything about how much Liam's hair tickles, or the way his breathing is kind of snuffly - he lets Liam doze, content to hold him, to be gentle. To be able to be gentle._

_"Stop fighting it," he murmurs, suddenly aware that Liam's shifting around like he's trying not to fall asleep. "Go back to sleep. He hit you with a pretty powerful sedative. Next time you wake up, you'll be back to normal."_

_There's a long pause; Liam's breath hitches a little, and he rolls over to look at Brett. "I don't think I can do this anymore," he says softly._

_Brett's stomach drops right out of him. "Do what? Liam-"_

_Liam licks his lips nervously, dropping his eyes. "I can't - I don't think I can keep running, and hiding, and barely making it," Liam admits. "I can't keep trying to save people and watching them die, being tired and getting hurt over and over... I just... can't."_

_Brett feels himself soften; he gathers Liam closer, wondering what the hell happened in there that Liam's suddenly realised this. "We aren't," he says. "We aren't going to keep doing it. We'll die if we keep it up. We're going back to their community. Apparently it's fairly safe there. You can get your side fixed up, I can rest my ribs. We can sleep."_

_"I don't know if I'm ever gonna forget half the stuff that happened back there," Liam says, his voice trembling. "It... it's too much, it..."_

_Brett feels alarmed, but he tries not to show it as he says, "What happened?"_

_Liam shakes his head. "No. I'm not telling you that. You don't need to know."_

_Brett's floored; he's trying to help, but he can't do that if Liam won't let him. "You don't get to make that call," he argues._

_"Yes I do. I saw it. And I'd give anything to not have. I'm not - I'm not going to tell you something that's going to fucking traumatise you. You spend all your time looking after me, so how about you let me do the same? Just this once?" And Liam looks up at him pleadingly, his eyes a little glossy, and so Brett relents._

_Just this once, he promises Liam silently. Just this once, I'll let you do what you have to do to protect me._

_"Get some sleep," he says quietly. "We've got a long way to go."_

~*~

"Brett. Look."

Brett turns to Liam. He's sitting on the couch with some food, and Fudge is standing in front of him. "What?" Brett asks.

Liam holds up a piece of meat, and there's a pause before Fudge sits up on his hind legs and raises his front paws, moving them up and down slowly and whining.

"Oh God, Liam, you taught him to beg?" 

"He just started doing it!" Liam laughs, tossing Fudge the scrap of meat he was teasing the animal with. "How cute is that?"

Brett's never heard Liam call anyone or anything cute sincerely before. "I guess," he says, going to sit down next to Liam and putting an arm around his shoulders. "Is he gonna do it to everyone, though? Because if we take him to their community and he begs-"

"Try it," Liam encourages. "See if he does it for you."

Brett takes a piece of meat and holds it up. Fudge looks at him, wriggles a little closer, and rests his head on Brett's knee, but doesn't beg.

"That means he trusts you," Malia says to Liam. "When he sits up like that. He's not doing it for Brett because he'd have to expose his stomach."

"You're so smart," Liam coos to Fudge, burying his hands in Fudge's ruff. 

"No, he knows you're the soft touch," Brett teases. "The rest of us don't feed him off our own plates." He watches as Liam bends down a little more and lets Fudge lick his cheek, wrinkling his nose and laughing. "He probably also likes you more because you were the one who fixed his paw."

"That's because I love him," Liam says, kissing Fudge's face.

"Good lord," Stiles says. "Marry the dog, I dare you."

Liam throws a t-shirt at him, but he's smiling. 

~*~

Now that they're driving, Liam gets to sleep a lot.

Given that Liam's had all of five hours driving experience, and that he's exhausted from the sheer amount of work he was doing in Warranwood, nobody wants him to drive. Liam's using the opportunity to catch up on sleep, which means he's currently passed out with his head in Brett's lap.

It's sort of cute, really - as soon as Liam lay down, he passed out cold. It's been like that for a few hours now, and Brett's worked his way through most of a novel, done inventory and napped a little himself, sitting up.

Fudge is lying next to Liam. Not sleeping, not even close, but lying with his head on his paws, sighing occasionally - like he's bored or something. Still, he's a loyal dog, and he rarely leaves Liam's side.

"I guess you're a good dog," Brett yawns.

Fudge's ears swivel around to listen to his voice. When Brett doesn't say anything else, they droop a little. He's attentive, too, not just loyal.

"A dog might be good," Kira says. She's sitting back on the bed with Brett and Liam. "The kids will like him, after all, and he's really friendly."

"Yeah. He'll be good. Keep Liam company too."

Kira hesitates before the speaks again. "How... how do you think he's going to adjust?" she asks softly. "To River's End, I mean."

"How many people have you got?"

"Maybe one fifty."

Brett sighs, looks down at Liam. He's carding his hand gently through Liam's soft, glossy hair. "He'll be okay eventually," he says. "He's pretty nervous around people though. I mean, he has every reason to be, considering how many have tried to kill him. But he should be fine if people just, I dunno, leave him alone to deal with it."

"I'll make sure they know that," Kira says. "The group leaders and stuff. I'll make sure they know to leave him to it. But there'll be medical evaluations when you get in - security ones, too. That part should be easy. We'll all vouch for you, and everyone's gonna know you aren't dangerous."

"People will be suspicious, though, right?" Brett asks quietly. "Especially of new people." 

"Yeah. Maybe a little." Kira looks down at Liam, her face soft. "Maybe not him as much."

Brett nods. "What're you going to name the baby?"

"Liam suggested Sunflower for a girl, and Sodapop for a boy," Kira says.

"Please don't let Liam name your kid," Brett mutters. "It's bad enough we have a dog named Fudge." 

Kira giggles. "He was only joking." Her face softens. "He actually suggested Mason for a boy... or Lori for a girl."

Brett stills. "Lori?"

"He said... that was your sister's name."

Brett's throat closes over; he nods. He didn't think Liam would remember that. But Liam seems to retain details that most other people would just forget.

"I'm sorry," Kira says.

"That's okay. I just - I hadn't thought about her recently." Brett swallows. "You should name it whatever you want."

"Lori," Kira says quietly. "If that's okay with you." 

"She would've liked that," Brett says.

He startles a little when Kira reaches out and takes his hand gently. Ultimately, he clings to it, remembering the way Lori used to laugh and the way she'd crawl into bed with him when she had a nightmare.

"I wasn't there to protect her," he mumbles.

Kira tips her head back to rest it against the wall, her expression broken open and sympathetic. She doesn't say anything. Brett's glad for that.

He's going to make sure Kira's baby is safe, that's for damn sure.

~*~

River's End is one hell of a fucking hike away.

Liam's pretty punchy and crabby - he hates being cooped up in the RV, but they need to keep moving while they can - put as much distance between them and the broken implants as possible. Still, Liam's taken to pacing restlessly in the confined space of the RV, and he's getting more and more reluctant to come back inside when they do stop.

Eventually, they come across a wider stretch of the highway, near a large town - there are cars here, which means the opportunity to siphon fuel, which is something that can't be wasted. When it comes time to volunteer, Liam's out the door so fast Brett barely notices him leaving.

"I'll go with him," he says, picking up his machete and handgun and heading outside.

Liam's already managed to walk an impressive distance away from the RV; Fudge is nearby, sniffing around the cars. 

"Hey," Brett says quietly.

"Hi," Liam breathes; he's got his face tilted back. "You got the containers?"

Brett holds up four of them awkwardly - they're pretty much empty, save for the fourth. "Let's do this." 

They start going through the cars systematically, Brett on the left and Liam on the right, using knives to pry open fuel caps when the keys aren't around. Brett finally finds a tank with something in it after fifteen minutes of searching.

Forty five minutes later, they've got four full containers of fuel; Brett straightens up, his ribs twinging. "Okay," he sighs, relieved. "Let's go back."

"Do we have to?" Liam pleads.

"Liam..." He rubs his face; he never thought Liam would end up being difficult to manage over something as small and insignificant as a long drive, but he is, and Brett's patience is wearing down. "We have to... those implants, if they were tracking devices, the Keepers probably know by now that we destroyed them. They'll be trying to find us. We need to be as far away as we can be."

"We've been driving for four days," Liam says, his voice rising. "Literally four fucking days, and the only time we leave the RV is to piss or shit or both! How much longer do we have to drive before you think we're safe?"

"If I got my way we'd never stop," Brett says, keeping his voice deliberately even. 

Liam presses the heels of his hands into his eyes, striding away a few steps. Fudge whines unhappily. 

"Liam, come on," Brett says. "It's not that big a deal-"

Liam starts pacing between a few parked cars; Brett watches, feeling slightly alarmed, and decides not to say anything else until he's worked out what the fuck is going on. He wants to snap at Liam and tell him that it's just a car trip and he doesn't even have to drive, but he feels like that's gonna be less than helpful.

He tries reasoning instead. "I'm sure it's not that further," he says, trying to placate Liam into ceasing the pacing - which is kind of unnerving, really. "We'll be there in no time."

Liam makes a faint, distressed moaning noise, stops pacing, and bends over with his hands on his knees. Fudge barks, once, quietly.

"Oh, shit," Brett breathes. Now he gets it - Liam's having a panic attack. And by the looks of it Brett's far too late - and insensitive - to stop it from escalating into a full-blown episode. 

"Hey," he says, hurrying forward. Liam's gasping for air, breathing shallow and rapid and high-pitched, shaking all over, still bent down. "Hey, Liam, Liam, look at me. Look at me, baby."

That has the exact opposite effect that Brett wanted it to have; Liam sobs around a futile gasp for air.

"Shit," Brett whispers. "Shit, shit." He looks around, but none of the car doors are open; he needs Liam sitting down. "Okay." He takes Liam's shoulders, gently, and begins to try and lower him to the ground. "C'mon, Li, sit down. Sit down."

Finally, he's got Liam leaning against a car, sitting down, trying to get Liam to straighten his legs out - but Liam's body is locked rigidly in position, and he's still gasping so badly Brett's not going to be surprised if he just loses consciousness. 

"Liam, breathe," he begs. "Just - just do what I'm doing. Breathe, baby, come on, deep breaths. Just try. I know it hurts, just try." 

He's knocked a little as Fudge brushes past him, sticking his head under Liam's arm. "Fudge," Brett says, feeling frustrated. "Now's a really bad time!"

Liam winds one hand into Fudge's ruff and keeps it there, clutching the dog for dear life. Fudge settles next to him, licking Liam's ear desperately.

Okay, Brett decides. The dog stays.

"Breathe," Brett tells Liam softly. "You're okay. There's enough air. Just slow your breathing down. With me. Here." He takes Liam's other hand - fuck, Liam's shaking so badly it's frightening - and puts it on his own chest. "With me."

Liam bunches Brett's shirt and hoodie up under his palm, but he's starting to try and breathe again, and that's good. Brett swallows, trying to keep his own breathing steady - one of them has to stay calm, and Liam can't even talk yet.

_I gave him a fucking panic attack,_ he thinks guiltily. _I should've known... I should've been able to tell, he told me he's had them before... I knew he was upset..._

He hears Liam swallow, opens his eyes to find Liam tilting his head back. His breathing has slowed, but it's still hitching warningly - he's not finished coming down yet, that much is obvious.

_What the fuck do I do_? Brett wonders helplessly. em >How do I help?

He's too scared to say anything in case he triggers another attack. He settles for shuffling a little bit closer, then closes his hand around Liam's, still on his chest.

"You're doing great," he offers. "Good job. Just... keep breathing like that. Slow."

He's never dealt with this before. He's seen Liam have an I.E.D episode, albeit a small one, and that fizzled out almost as soon as it occurred. He hasn't dealt with anxiety - Liam mentioned to him, very briefly, that he's had panic attacks, but he didn't tell Brett they were this bad. 

Liam moves, wipes his eyes, and takes a deep, shuddering breath.

"You okay?" Brett asks anxiously.

Liam's lower lip wobbles a little before he sets his jaw and nods, then looks down at his lap and away from Brett. Brett's forgotten how to breathe - forgotten how to act. This is his boyfriend, who needs him, who's depending on him to make the right choices by him, and Brett's suddenly forgotten how to function. He wants to be sympathetic, but he's not sure how to be. It's like he can't remember how to calm Liam down, and that's freaking him out. 

Liam withdraws his arm from Brett's chest suddenly, tugs his sleeves down over his hands, and pulls his arms back to rest in his lap. He's still shaking. "Sorry," he whispers.

"Aw, fuck, Liam," Brett murmurs. "Don't - don't apologise, that wasn't your fault. That was all me." 

They sit in silence for a while. Liam continues to shake, but his breathing is starting to sound better.

"I can't get back in the RV," Liam says suddenly; his voice is trembling. "I'm sorry, I can't, not right now. Just - just please give me five more minutes." 

Brett sits back, rubbing his face guiltily. "You can have all the time you want," he murmurs. "It's not the driving, is it? It's the people. You aren't used to the people."

Liam nods tiredly. 

Brett buries his face in his hands; he could probably drown in the amount of guilt he's currently feeling. He thought Liam was just being impatient, but all the pacing and snappishness was a symptom of anxiety. Brett ignored it. Now Liam's curled up on the ground in the middle of the highway, cheeks wet with tears, looking stressed and flighty and scared as hell.

"I'm sorry," Liam says again, voice breaking.

"Don't - don't apologise. This was my fault. I should've known." Brett shakes his head. "Are you feeling better? Can you breathe okay?"

"Yeah." Liam nods. "Thank you."

"For what?"

"Talking me down."

"I was the one who put you there in the first place," Brett says quietly. "Let's not forget that."

"Brett, it wasn't your fault either." Liam sits up a little. "It's been coming on ever since you dug that implant out. I should've told you." 

"Did you feel like you couldn't?"

Liam's rubbing his eyes, still seeming sort of distressed. "No," he mumbles. "I wanted to, but... there was always someone else around." 

"I'm-"

"Don't say sorry again," Liam says with a weak smile. "Just help me up."

Brett stands and helps Liam to his feet; Liam wipes his face self consciously. "Fuck," he mutters. "I have the emotional strength of a melting marshmallow."

"That's not true," Brett says, fighting back a smile. "But the description was funny."

They stand there for a moment; Liam steps forward and hugs him.

"Sorry again," he says.

"If I'm not allowed to apologise, neither are you," Brett says. "Let's... are you okay to go back? Or do you wanna stay out longer?"

"I'm alright," Liam says unhappily. "I guess... sooner we get there, sooner I never have to get back in that fucking thing again."

"Exactly." Brett takes his hand. "Let's go." 

~*~

There are no more panic attacks from Liam after that.

Whenever he looks like he's getting a little punchy, Brett finds an excuse to pull over, even if it's just for five minutes. Liam seems to appreciate it, and the short breaks seem to be doing wonders for his mood. Even Stiles comments that Liam isn't as snappish.

It helps that they have a timeline now too. Kira says they're two days out. And now that Liam knows that, he seems to at least be able to focus on the fact that it will be over.  
Brett still feels guilty, though, for failing to recognise pretty obvious Liam-signals of distress. He vows not to do it again.

He's sleeping, an arm curled over Liam's waist, when Kira shakes him awake. "Brett," she says quietly.

Brett sits up; Liam doesn't move. "Huh?" he asks.

"We're here," she says.

Brett's stomach somersaults. "Right," he says. "Okay, um - what happens now?"

"Stiles and Scott will go ahead with Malia - I'm going to stay and introduce you to my dad. Then we'll see."

"Alright." Brett shakes Liam. "Wake up, Li. We're here."

"Here?" Liam asks hopefully. "In River's End?"

"Yeah."

Liam's face goes suddenly white. "Shit, we're here."

"Yeah." Brett leans out the window - all he can see are massive steel walls, a few watch towers with people in them, and a gate ahead. 

The RV stops, and Brett watches as Scott gets out, helping Stiles. As soon as the gate opens, they drive through.

Now Brett can see it - this really is a whole community. Houses, everywhere, a church, and a hotel that looks like it's been converted into an infirmary.

"It's huge," Liam says faintly.

"Yeah."

"Got anything other than "yeah" for me? It's not very comforting."

"... More people means more protection."

"You're shit at this."

The RV stops inside, and the gate closes. Quite suddenly, everyone is piling out, leaving Brett and Liam sitting on the bed.

"I can't believe we're here," Liam says.

"Me neither." Brett's watching as Kira embraces a middle-aged Asian man who must be her father. "Uh... let's go. I mean, let's get out."

Liam nods and follows Brett to the door, picking up his pack and crossbow when Brett dons his things as well. After taking a breath, he steps off the RV.

"Brett," Kira says. "This is my dad, Ken Yukimura. Dad, this is Brett - he and Liam, uh, the shorter one's Liam - rescued me and Malia from Ashburton."

Liam steps up beside Brett nervously, Fudge hot on his heels. "It was mostly Liam," Brett says, shaking Mr. Yukimura's hand.

He smiles - warm and friendly, not at all guarded. "Then I owe you my life, Liam," he says.

"Ah, nah," Liam mumbles. "It's good." 

Mr. Yukimura doesn't comment on Liam's lack of social ability; Kira must have debriefed him quickly on their situation while they were still in the RV.

Fudge sniffs around Liam's feet, then sits. Mr. Yukimura looks at him, obviously just having noticed his presence.

"A dog?" he asks curiously. "Is he safe?"

"He's safe," Brett says. "He'll just follow Liam."

"Liam?"

Liam turns when he hears his name; his crossbow is halfway up, like he can't decide if he should aim it or not. Mr. Yukimura smiles at him gently, seeming to notice how skittish Liam is.

"I'm Ken Yukimura," he says, extending a hand. "I run the housing and community programs around here."

Liam hesitates before shaking Mr. Yukimura's hand. "Nice to meet you," he mumbles.

"And who's this?" Mr. Yukimura gestures at Fudge.

"That's Fudge," Liam says. 

"And is he yours?"

"He's mine." Liam turns in a brief circle. "Is he okay?"

"He's fine," Mr. Yukimura says. "As long as he's well trained."

"Sit," Liam says, and Fudge promptly sits down, exactly where he is, and looks at Liam, awaiting instruction. Liam's lips twitch in a smile. "Good boy." 

"Well trained," Mr. Yukimura comments. "He shouldn't be a problem. We'll make sure he's up to date on vaccinations." He nods at Liam's crossbow. "I won't ask you to get rid of that... but you also don't need to point it at anyone. We're friends here."

Liam lowers the crossbow, then slings it over his back. He seems to trust that; Kira's smiling at them both hopefully.

"Alright," Mr. Yukimura says, clapping his hands together cheerfully. "Time for interviews."

~*~

The interviews have them meeting five different people - Liam sits next to him with his knees bouncing uncontrollably, which nobody calls him out on.

Scott's mother is on the panel, and so is Stiles' father - Mrs. McCall, who was a nurse before, and Sheriff Stilinski, one of the only surviving members of the police department. Also on the panel are a Dr. Deaton, Ms. Morrell, and a man introduced to them as Logan, who seems to be the head of the miniature council.

They interview Brett first, which he thinks is meant to make Liam a little less nervous. If it helps, even minutely, Brett can't tell; Liam's jittery and skittish the whole time, and Brett knows he's going to be dealing with Liam's nerves probably for the foreseeable future.

"So," Mrs. McCall says kindly. Her eyes are on Liam - she can tell he's nervous. "Do either of you have any skills that might be useful?"

"I'm okay with medical stuff," Brett says, and nudges Liam.

Liam blinks, seemingly wrenching himself out of a daze. "Hunting," he says quietly.

Brett chews his lip anxiously. "He can take down a deer at two hundred yards with a crossbow," he says helpfully. "He's good at snares, too, and prepping meat so it keeps longer."  
Logan looks interested in that. "Hunting?" he asks. "You're young."

"Learned fast," Liam says nervously. "Before." 

Brett's thankful they don't seem to be pressing him too hard; Liam's nerves are fucking shot, and it's showing, painfully obviously. But Fudge is sitting by his side, panting lightly, and that seems to be helping. 

At the end of the day, the interview is short, because they're not only moderately useful, but because they have Scott, Stiles, Malia and Kira vouching for them. 

After their interviews, they're passed back to Mr. Yukimura, who begins leading them out of the "town hall" as everyone else is calling it. "Right," he says. "Now that we've been given the okay, time to find you some housing."

"Housing?" Brett asks.

"All new residents get a place of their own," Mr. Yukimura explains. "Unless we have reasons to be suspicious of them, but you passed the interviews with flying colours - and I'm sure you could both do with some rest." His eyes slide towards Liam as he says it; Liam's looking kind of wide-eyed and shell-shocked, blinking dazedly in the bright winter sunlight, hands shoved into his pockets.

"You can say that again," Brett says.

"Any requests on housing?" Mr. Yukimura asks. "Kira tells me you're... together?"

"We are," Brett says quickly. "Uh, not that we - really want that public knowledge yet."

"I understand. Would you like to be housed together? Or would Liam be more comfortable with a family?"

He's right there, Brett thinks despairingly, a bit chagrined that everyone is deferring to him to make decisions for Liam. That is, until he turns to Liam and finds him staring off at the walls, almost wistfully. He's not even paying attention.

"No," he says. "Together. Please."

"Alright," Ken says, giving Liam a concerned look. "Follow me then." 

Brett tugs Liam's arm softly, and Liam seems to snap back into it, blinking. "Huh?"

"Come on," he murmurs. "We're getting a house."

They follow Mr. Yukimura for almost fifteen minutes, and Brett tries to take in everything he's saying - there's electricity powered by solar panels but it's only allowed during restricted hours, food is rationed but they get to keep some of theirs, and scouts will take lists of things they need from them before doing runs. His head spins. This is a real community. Safe. No zombies.

"Here we are," Mr. Yukimura says, stepping up the front porch of a house. "This one."

It's small, made of brick, with a wraparound porch. Ken opens the door for them. "It's small," he says, almost apologetically.

Brett doesn't care. He's trying to keep track of where Liam is - because Liam seems like he's kind of a nervous wreck right now - and not lose sight of him. Liam's moving in his peripheral vision, Fudge by his side. 

The house is a single-story, shaded by trees, with a wraparound porch. When they enter, they're greeted with an open-plan living room that extends into a hallway, giving way to a bathroom at the end of the hall and two bedrooms, right across from each other. 

"Is this alright?" Mr. Yukimura asks. "We can upgrade you. You saved my daughter, so if there's anything at all you need-"

"I like it," Liam says, surprising Brett. "Thanks." 

"Of course." He looks pleased. "It's small, but it has character."

It's small, Brett realises. That's why Liam likes it - everything is within view, no matter where in the house you are. It's defensible. It fits every single one of Liam's usual hidey-hole criteria - small, relatively dark, surrounded by either trees or other buildings, removed from other houses or potential dangers, open-plan living, no stairs. Without fail, that's what Liam chooses every time, if it's possible.

"We do have running water," Mr. Yukimura says, "and the plumbing all works. There's limited electricity - everything is solar-powered and during winter, the solar power can be hard to come by. Right now, we have permissible energy times - there's a chart in the town hall." 

Liam nods quietly. The place has an l-shaped couch with a chase, a coffee table, a bookcase that has books on it. Brett assumes the bedrooms are furnished too. He doesn't ask to see the rest; he's happy here if Liam is, and Liam's looking like he's about to jump out of his skin, so he says, "This is great. Thanks."

"Alright," Mr. Yukimura says cheerfully. "That's great. If you need anything, I'll be back at the town hall. Our family lives just across the road - come say hello when you're done. For what you did for Kira, we'd like to feed you a meal."

"Thank you," Brett says, smiling, and Mr. Yukimura leaves them to it.

Liam sets his crossbow on the counter quietly, then puts his pack down. Brett hesitates before moving closer to him, then putting his hand on Liam's back gently. 

"You okay?" he asks softly.

Liam blinks and looks at him. "Yeah. Just - this is weird. Having a house. That's ours." 

"Mm." Brett gestures. "There's two bedrooms even."

Liam tilts his head.

"Just, if you wanted the space," Brett says hastily. "You don't... have to share with me anymore if you don't want to."

"I wanna be as close as you'll let me," Liam says, smiling wanly. 

"Well," Brett says, tugging Liam by the hand. "I guess that means we're choosing the softest bed." 

The softest bed happens to be located in what Brett assumes is the master bedroom - it's a king-sized, too, and he laughs when Liam sighs, crawls onto it, and stops just short of actually getting his legs up. The duvet is light and fluffy, and Brett's not sure it'll be warm enough. 

"You know what this means?" he asks.

Liam tilts his face sleepily. "What?"

"We can actually wash our clothes. There's power here. We can do laundry."

"You do the laundry. I'm not doing the laundry."

Brett's jaw drops, and Liam smiles at him - a totally shit-eating grin at Brett's expression. "Wow," Brett says. "You really are a teenager." 

"I really am." Liam sits up, groaning unhappily. "Guess we'd better get down to the med ward."

"Yeah. But - hey. We're here to stay. They told us that. So let's unpack."

Liam seems to like that idea, so they do - and he even, very, very begrudgingly helps with the laundry. They can't put it on yet, but it's ready to go. Brett's stunned that they'll have clean clothes. 

He's downright shocked to see Liam pull out the carved bear he made months ago and put it on one of the bedside tables along with his glasses. "You kept that?" he asks. It's kind of an awkward thing to carry around.

"Of course I kept it." Liam smiles fondly at the bear. "I badgered you every day to finish carving the fucking thing. And I know it's because I was high as shit most of the time, but still." 

Brett chuckles. "You weren't that high."

"No, I was," Liam disagrees, pulling more stuff out of his bag. "I was just trying really, really hard to be lowkey about it."

Brett chuckles. "You did a good job." He stands. "Ready?" 

Liam stands too, but he looks nervous. "You okay around all these people?" Brett asks.

"No. I'm wigging the fuck out," Liam admits. "I don't think I've seen this many people in... in years, really."

Brett nods. "That's alright," he says quietly. "Look, nobody's expecting you to adjust straight away. And I mean - even I feel weird about it all. They've already agreed we can get our medical evaluations together. So you aren't gonna be alone with anyone." 

Liam nods. "You're freaking too?"

"A little." The idea seems to comfort Liam a little - knowing that he isn't alone must help him. "C'mon. Let's get this over and done with."

~*~

Brett's medical evaluation is simple - blood and urine samples, a cheek swab, a brief physical test for his ribs and leg. It's over in less than half an hour.

Liam's is a little more complicated. Mrs. McCall is handling them both, and while she collects samples at the same time, it's soon Liam's turn for a more thorough examination. 

"Can you take your shirt off, sweetie?" she asks Liam kindly. "Won't be for long."

Liam nods and strips off his layers of clothes. They're both still grimy as hell, but she doesn't seem to mind; she immediate notices the weal on Liam's side.

"What's this?" she asks, probing it gently.

Liam flinches. "Stab wound," he says.

Her eyes widen a little, and she looks up at him. "When was this?" 

"Almost two months ago now," Brett says softly. "He was stabbed in a fight. The blade must have glanced off his ribs, because there was no internal bleeding. He had a bad infection, fought it off, but there's still muscular pain - the spasms can keep him down for hours." 

She straightens up. "Alright," she says softly. "Liam, sweetie, we're going to get you down for an x-ray, alright? We need to know severe it is. Have you had an x-ray before?"

Liam nods.

"Okay. Follow me. Brett, you can come too," she says. "It wouldn't hurt you to see this." 

Brett wonders why that is, but he follows her, and soon enough Liam's having an x-ray taken of the damaged area. He seems okay at the moment - probably because it's just them. They had to leave Fudge at the house.

When the x-ray is done, they're taken to an office room to wait. Liam's legs start bouncing again; Brett puts his hands on them and swivels to face Liam.

"You're okay," he says quietly, surprised when Liam takes a deep breath and seems to noticeably calm down.

They actually start to talk a little before Mrs. McCall enters the room and sits down. "Alright, boys," she says, her eyes kind where she watches them. "This is what's going to happen now. We've done your interviews and your medical examinations - providing everything comes back clean, you'll be integrated into the community. You have a week to settle in - there's a roster of jobs for people to do, and you'll contribute to those for the first week. We'll spend that time evaluating what skills you have and give you a permanent job in a suitable field - Liam?"

Brett turns. Liam's staring straight ahead at the wall behind Mrs. McCall's head, just over her shoulder, eyes glazed and unseeing. He feels unease stirring within him; Liam's never looked like that before.

"Liam," he says quietly.

Liam blinks, seeming to snap out of his daze. "Sorry," he murmurs, and Brett notices his leg bouncing nervously.

Disassociation, Brett realises. He's disassociating. 

"We can take a break, sweetie," Mrs. McCall says kindly.

"That's okay," Liam says softly. "Thank you though." 

"Okay. Just tell me if you need to, alright?" She looks down at her files. "So far what we have recorded is that Brett's got at least some experience in medicine, and that you're a fairly skilled hunter and tracker. Is that right?"

"Yeah." Brett doesn't butt in; Mrs. McCall's realised the same thing he did just then, and she's trying to keep Liam present. 

"It's likely you'll be put in the hospital and runner fields, respectively," she says. "But we'll talk about that in a week. What I want to do is look at your medical results." She sits up. "Who's first?"

"Me," Brett says.

"Okay." She pushes his file towards him. "That's yours. You've got three broken ribs and two that have hairline fractures - they're on their way to healing, and you probably already know there's not much to do about it. The injury in your leg is localised to the knee joint, so we're gonna try and get you into some physiotherapy to fix it."

"Cool," Brett says, relieved at the prospect of having full mobility back. 

"So, Liam," Mrs. McCall says. "You aren't quite so cut and dry." She pushes his file towards him.

Liam takes it and hands it to Brett. "I don't understand any of it," he admits. "No point giving it to me. Alright, lay it on me." 

Brett flips open the folder as Mrs. McCall says quietly, "From what we can tell, you're in remarkably good health - we're still waiting on the blood tests and swab cultures to come back, but you seem to have healed pretty well from the injury on your side."

"There's a but in here somewhere," Liam says miserably.

"But," she says regretfully, "the muscles in your side, along your chest wall, are torn. They've healed wrong, which is probably from moving around too much afterwards - it couldn't have been avoided. Do you want the good news or bad news first?"

"Bad." 

"Okay. The bad news is that they are badly damaged, and that they aren't going to get better on their own." She pauses. "The good news is that they can be completely reconstructed with surgery, and you'll be almost totally free of pain afterwards." 

"Surgery?" Liam asks. "Won't that lay me up for a little while?"

"A week or so," she says. "Light movement after that." 

Brett looks down at Liam's file, catching sight of the scans of his side. The muscles do look sort of warped, he realises. No wonder he's been in pain.

Then, at the bottom, he sees a note.

_While Liam is outwardly physically healthy, he's exhibiting potential symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder and generalised anxiety disorder. Given his history from the last two years, this suggests that he has been placed under repeated and severe emotional distress._

Brett closes his eyes, rubs his face, and flips Liam's folder shut. PTSD. And really, he should have fucking known. He should have. He knows Liam's had panic attacks, knows that the nightmares and flashbacks keep him up all night unless he's too tired to wake up from them. 

"Brett?" Liam asks.

Brett stands up and throws the files down. "I'll be back in a moment," he says, and strides out into the hall.

He only goes a few feet before sliding down against the wall, trying not to cry. He feels like he's failed Liam somehow, failed to keep him safe and secure from all the awful fucking bullshit out here. Now he doesn't know how to fix it.

The door to the office opens, and Liam exits, shutting it quietly behind him and joining Brett on the ground. There's a moment's silence.

"I'm the one with the PTSD," Liam jokes weakly. "Shouldn't I be the one having a meltdown?"

Brett shakes his head. "I'm sorry, Liam." 

"It's not your fault," Liam says. "You saved my life. More than once, just in case you needed reminding."

"You were fine before you met me," Brett says. "You were getting by and doing really well."

"Brett, I was going to kill myself," Liam reminds him. "Remember I told you that? I didn't have a plan or anything, but I knew I was going to one day. I never would've left Ashburton without you. Yeah, I might not have been stabbed - but I still would've been traumatised. You can't change that."

Brett turns his head to look at Liam, whose gaze is soft and steady on him. He meets Brett's eyes without flinching, without looking away, without being afraid. 

"I wish I could," Brett says, his voice breaking. 

~*~

The house is blessedly quiet when they get back in.

Liam's shivering, and Brett's feeling a little on the colder side too. He gestures at the bathroom - he stopped to check the designated electricity times on the way back - and says, "Why don't you clean up, have a shower? I'll get some dinner on."

Liam nods uncertainly and heads off to the bathroom. Fudge sits down at Brett's feet and looks up at him expectantly.

"Yeah, you get some too."

Brett's almost finished warming up some of their leftover rabbit stew when Liam exits the hallway. Brett does a double take; Liam's hair is wet and clean, already noticeably lighter in colour than what it was before, his skin smooth and pale and clean-shaven. He's wearing clothes that actually sort of fit him.

"Wow," Brett says.

Liam tugs his sleeves uncomfortably. "What?" he asks quietly.

"I just - I don't think I've ever seen you that clean," Brett says, stunned. "Or healthy-looking. Come here."

Liam pads over to him silently, and Brett - who's sitting on a barstool - grabs Liam's waist and presses his face into Liam's chest. "You smell good," he mumbles. "Is that - is that soap?"

"Shut up," Liam grumbles, but he winds his arms around Brett's shoulders and neck and leans on him anyway. Out of his layers of apocalypse survivor clothes, disarmed of his knives and crossbow and guns, wearing grey sweats and a long-sleeved blue crewneck... Liam looks his age. Really looks only seventeen, and no older than that. Especially clean-shaven.

Brett tightens his grip on Liam's waist with a sigh. He can't believe Liam's survived this long. But here he is, warm and solid beneath Brett's head.

"So," Brett says. "What do you think so far?"

He hears Liam swallow. "It's cool."

The answer is short, succinct, and about as far from the truth as Liam can get. Brett leans back a little, but Liam avoids his eyes.

"You having trouble?" he asks quietly.

"There are too many people," Liam says weakly. "Way too many people. I just - it feels like every time we turn around there's another person looking at us suspiciously or someone asking us questions or wanting to interview us."

"They aren't suspicious," Brett says gently. "They're curious. But I know what you mean. Now that they've got our medical histories and stuff, they'll start getting us settled into a routine and people will stop noticing. We're only interesting because we're new."

Liam rolls his shoulders - Brett knows by now that's a sign of distress, so he turns Liam around and starts kneading the muscles in his back. "Hey," he says softly. "Don't freak out, okay? It'll be fine. And I know you don't believe me, but you'll adjust. It might take a while but it's not always gonna be hard for you, you know?"

"You're right. I don't believe you." Liam turns back around and manages to worm his way back into Brett's grip. "Thanks, though."

"No problem." Brett gestures. "Eat something."

Liam eats with him, and then retires to the bedroom as Brett heads off to shower. 

The hot water - hot water, Jesus - sluices through what must be layers of dirt and grime and sweat from God knows how many months of travelling and sickness. He feels about a thousand times more human when he's cleaned off, dried, and in some of the new clothes Liam and Kira pilfered from Warranwood before they left there.

When he enters the bedroom, Liam's sprawled out on his stomach, dead asleep. Fudge is lying with his head in the middle of Liam's back, rising and falling with his breath. His ears swivel towards Brett as he enters, and he huffs softly.

"Yeah, me too." He nods at Liam. "You watching him?"

Fudge lifts his head and cocks it, like he's asking Brett if he's serious. When Brett approaches the bed, he jumps off it and lies on the floor next to Liam - where there's a pile of blankets and pillows Liam must have put there specifically.

"If anything happens to you he's gonna lose it," he tells Fudge tiredly. "Please don't get eaten."

Fudge whines softly.

"Good." Then he realises he's talking to the dog the same way Liam does and shakes his head a little. "Jesus." He climbs onto the bed and nudges Liam until he eventually scoots to the middle of the bed. "That's it, baby." 

He pulls the covers over them both and rolls onto his back, sighing deeply. The moment he does, Liam's rolling up beside him, burrowing down somewhere in the vicinity of his ribs.

Brett smiles fondly. "Dork." 

It's so nice to have a real bed again. He can stretch out, he's warm, it's soft, there are pillows - the whole experience is kind of orgasmic, really.

Orgasmic. His gaze drifts to the headboard. He could totally fuck Liam against that. A few different ways, really, depending on their creativity and flexibility. Mostly Liam's flexibility.

He looks down at Liam, who's fast asleep on him, his hair soft and mouth slightly open. Liam's a teenager; he's pretty flexible.

He smiles a little, beginning to drift off. Yeah. Sex against the headboard sounds pretty great. Maybe Liam will ride him...

~*~

A sharp kick to his back wakes him up.

He groans, rolls over. "Liam?" he asks.

Liam's still now, but Brett can see, even in the darkness, that his hand is pressed over his side. "Sorry," Liam gasps. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be." Brett reaches out to try and press the pain away, but Liam flinches from him, and he stops short. That's when he notices that Liam's eyes are wet and streaming. "Nightmare?" he asks quietly.

"I dreamed about that Keeper," Liam moans. "That fucking - that twisted asshole and his stupid, the way he smelled, and how much bigger he was, and-"

The one that tried to rape him, Brett realises. He thought they'd have at least one night's good rest before Liam's demons chased him down and knocked on the door.

"When we were out there and everyone was hurt or sick or dying, I didn't have time to think about it," Liam blurts. "You were all relying on me coming back and making things work. I went out and dealt with the cold and the wet and the silence and I did that every day for more than two weeks and then when I came back I was so tired I'd just, you know, I'd just fall asleep and not even dream."

Brett nods. "And now we're safe and there's nothing to distract you," he says quietly.

"Exactly," Liam breathes, his breath hitching helplessly. "Brett, I - I swear every night I can feel him behind me, holding me down, and I can smell him and everything."

The thought of Liam remembering it, over and over again, helpless to stop it, distresses Brett so much he feels his breathing almost stop. "Do you want me to hold you?" he asks, voice wavering. "Until you go to sleep?"

Liam's face breaks with relief; he nods. Brett moves closer, finally, with permission, and wraps Liam in his arms. He gets his hand on Liam's ribs and starts massaging the pain away, relieved when Liam goes lax in his arms.

"Go to sleep," Brett says. "I've got you."

"Okay," Liam whispers.

~*~

After Liam's results come back, properly, including his bloodwork, it's decided that he'll have immediate surgery on his torn muscles.

"I can't believe you're still moving," Mrs. McCall says as she hooks Liam up to an IV. "Didn't it hurt?"

"Sort of," Liam says evasively. "But uh, you know. Had things to do."

"Right." She looks at the paperwork she's been given. "Anything I should know before we get you down there?"

"Brett knows more about me than I do," Liam says. "Ask him."

Mrs. McCall turns to him; Brett clears his throat. "He's pretty sensitive to medication," he says. "If you're gonna dope him up on pain meds and antibiotics, give him an anti-emetic first, or he'll be puking all day."

Liam winces.

"Alright. Noted." Mrs. McCall gestures to Liam. "Lie back, sweetie. I'll be with you in a moment."

Liam lies back on the gurney, looking a little nervous. "I've never had surgery before," he says to Brett.

"Never?"

"Nope."

Brett sits on the bed. "Not so bad," he says. "It's not even like going to sleep really. There's just a big chunk of missing time." 

Liam nods, opens his mouth to say something, when Mrs. McCall comes back with Dr. Deaton. "Okay, Liam," he murmurs, voice soothing. "We're going to sedate you for this. It shouldn't be too long. You'll be awake before you know it."

"Okay," Liam says, accepting the mask they put on his face. "What do I do?"

Mrs. McCall flicks a machine, connected to the mask, on. "Count back from a hundred, sweetie," she says soothingly.

"One hundred." Liam already sounds dopey. "Ninety nine... ninety eight..." There's a long pause. "Ninety... three..."

"He skipped a few," Brett says, fighting back a smile as he watches Liam's eyes slip shut. 

"I'm impressed he got that far," she says. "Okay, Brett. Shouldn't be too long. I'll come and get you when he's done."

"Thank you," Brett says, and watches as they wheel Liam away.

~*~

He spends four hours being bored as shit; after the second, he goes home to check on Fudge, feeds him, and then walks back to the hospital.

One of the other "nurses" tells him that most of the equipment was brought here from a private health care facility somewhere nearby, and the rest from an aged care home when its residents were assimilated into River's End. Brett, despite being nervous about the outcome of Liam's surgery, is just grateful he's getting to have it at all.

He's dozing off in a chair when Mrs. McCall shakes him awake. "Hi, sweetie," she says softly. 

"Hi," Brett says, sitting up and rubbing his eyes. "How'd he do?"

"Great. Our assistant surgeon tells me the damage has been completely repaired. He should be back on his feet within a fortnight."

He follows her down the hallway and into Liam's room - he's got an oxygen mask on, and there's an IV running into him, but he looks fairly healthy for someone who was just in surgery.

He's surprised when Liam's head tips towards the door. He blinks blearily - his eyes are clouded with the sedative, and it takes him a moment to focus on Brett.

"Hey, Liam," Brett says softly, entering the room and sitting down next to Liam's bed; Liam's eyes track him sluggishly. "How're you doing?" 

"You stayed," Liam says drowsily, and Brett's heart swells uncomfortably with affection.

"I stayed." He looks to Mrs. McCall, who's smiling fondly. "How long does he have to stay here for?"

"Dr. Deaton wants to keep him under observation for a few nights," she says. "Maybe three or four. He can stay longer than that if he feels like he needs to, but we're anticipating a pretty speedy recovery. He can go home after that." She takes Liam's chart from the bedside table. "So, we've got him dosed up on anti-emetics to stop him from vomiting. His weight is okay, but we really want to bring his body fat percentage up a bit, so we don't want him losing any more."

"Yeah, he can't really afford that," Brett says, watching as Liam's eyelids flutter shut. "Is he only just coming around now?"

"Yeah. He's doing well, though. The sedatives make everyone a little groggy." Mrs. McCall touches his shoulder - a motherly gesture Brett appreciates. "I'll leave you to it for a bit," she whispers.

"Thanks," Brett says, and turns back to Liam. "Hey, sleepyhead. You never answered my question. How're you feeling?" 

Liam yawns. "Tired."

"Yeah. I figured as much. Get some sleep, okay? I'll still be here when you wake up." 

Liam nods a little, and then he's drifting off. The hiss of the oxygen mask is the only noise.

Brett takes Liam's hand carefully, strokes the pad of his palm. "You're gonna be okay, Liam," he murmurs softly. "You're gonna be fine."


	20. Chapter Twenty - Acclimitise

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter was such a bitch about being written. Apologies if it seems like filler - there's general housework and plot setup to be done, which isn't nearly as interesting as mortal peril :P 
> 
> Thanks to everyone who supports this story still! <3

**Chapter Twenty - Acclimitise**

Liam spends four days in the hospital after his surgery.

It seems to have been unanimously agreed that their community programs won't start until Liam's healed up, because nobody badgers Brett about anything. He's allowed to stay with Liam for as much time as he'd like.

The first day after the surgery is the worst - Liam's groggy and in pain, but they're having to dial back on the medication to avoid withdrawal issues. He eats a little, but he's mostly uninterested in food. Brett hangs around, trying to get Liam to eat, but he's listless.

He is useful for something, though - coming down from the drug high, Liam's reluctant to let any of the nurses or doctors anywhere near him. He's too doped up on drugs to realise they're trying to help, and so Brett spends that first day taking Liam's temperature, changing his dressings, and administering medication. It's nothing he hasn't done before, and Liam's much more relaxed with him than he is with the nurses. 

The second day is marginally better. Liam's awake by six in the morning - his sleeping patterns are a fucking mess, and he's cranky about being awake, but he doesn't seem as doped up as the day before. 

Brett's sitting at his side, watching Liam like a hawk as he slowly - reluctantly - eats some eggs. Even with the anti-emetics, Liam doesn't want to eat. Brett's not sure if he isn't hungry, or whether he's afraid of throwing up.

The door opens sometime around seven; a doctor called Tamara sticks her head in, and Liam perks up a little. He seems to like her, Brett reflects - she's stout and solidly built, maybe ten or fifteen years older than them, and she's got a good bedside manner, even though she seems a little nervous around them.

"Morning, Liam," she says softly. "How're you doing?" 

"Better," Liam says, shifting a little where he's lying. "I'm kind of bored though."

She smiles a little. "That's good," she says, entering the room and closing the door behind her. "If you're bored, it means you're alert enough to be bored in the first place." 

"So... can I do something?" Liam asks.

She sits down on Liam's bed, on the edge - Liam doesn't even scoot back. "That's what I'm here to talk to you about," she says. "Can I check your bandages?"

"Sure." Brett watches as Liam lifts his t-shirt and Brett's hoodie - he's been living in it because the infirmary is cold and takes too much energy to heat - and exposes the surgery site on his side. 

"Sorry if my hands are cold," Tamara says as she puts her glasses on and begins peeling back the bandages. "It's hard to keep them warm in here." 

"That's okay," Liam says, even as shivers ripple up his side where her fingers touch. 

The surgery site doesn't look nearly as bad as the first round of stitches Brett put in. These ones are uniform and neat, small, in a straight, precise line. The area is heavily bruised, but that's pretty normal.

"Looking good," Tamara murmurs, probing the incision gently with gloved hands. "Any pain?" 

Liam shrugs, winces when she presses a little. "Not really. Sometimes. Right before the drugs are topped up I guess." 

She leans back from him and smiles. "Good." Then she turns to Brett. "Do you want to put new ones on?" she asks him, not meeting his eyes.

She's much more nervous around Brett than Liam, but Brett's beginning to wonder if that might have something to do with his height and gender. "Sure," he says. He appreciates that all the nurses around here seem to know that he prefers to be hands-on with Liam's recovery - that Liam prefers it that way too. 

She moves so Brett has room to work, and he gets to it - a thin layer of antibiotic cream across the stitches, cold water on a fresh bandage, medical tape around the edges to secure it down. Liam lies still for him, even though he's shivering. 

When he's done, he pulls Liam's clothes back into place. "Thanks," Liam says. 

"No problem." He turns to Tamara. "So what'd you wanna talk about?" he asks curiously.

"Oh." She sits in Brett's chair, hands clasped together nervously. "Listen, if you're up to it, Liam, we want to get you out of bed and walking today, alright?"

" _Today_?" Liam asks faintly. "Why?" He's looking at Brett as he says it, though, pleadingly - like he's asking Brett to get him out of it.

"Your blood could clot if you lie still for too long," Tamara says. "So we just want to get you moving a little. Up and down the hall, maybe. But only if you're up to it." 

There's a pause, but ultimately, Liam nods. "Okay," he murmurs. 

"Alright." She smiles, evidently happy with his choice. "Well, tell you what - we'll get you disconnected from everything and then up and moving, okay?"

"Can I stay?" Brett asks.

"Yeah, of course," Tamara says, looking surprised. "I'm just going to get some things - get you disconnected." 

She leaves the room, and Liam turns to him. "I don't want her to take the - the - you know," Liam mumbles.

"The what?" Brett asks, mystified.

Liam gestures vaguely at his lower half, blushing.

"Oh," Brett realises. "You don't want her to take the catheter out?"

"Can't you do it?" Liam mumbles.

"I don't know how to," Brett says gently. "I'm sorry."

Liam sighs unhappily. "That's okay."

"You really feel up to walking?" Brett asks softly. Liam's been bedridden for almost three days now - Dr. Deaton hasn't wanted him to move too much with the stitches - and after such an invasive surgery, Brett's not really sure Liam's up to walking.

"I'm okay," Liam mumbles. "It's gonna suck but I'm okay." 

"Alright," Brett says hesitantly.

He waits around while Tamara disconnected Liam's IV, heart rate monitor, and - last but not least - catheter, turning away for the last part. After that, she leaves Brett to help Liam into sweats, which he's been wearing intermittently to bed.

As he's tugging them onto Liam's legs, Liam puts a hand on his shoulder to steady himself. "I'm exhausted already," he groans.

"Yeah, it sucks, huh?" Brett asks. 

"I haven't even done anything."

"I know." Brett stands back. "You ready?"

"Mm." Liam stands up - he wobbles a little, but he keeps his feet underneath him, at any rate. After that, they walk out into the hallway.

Liam's not wincing or anything, but he already looks worn out. "So?" he asks, looking up at Brett. "How's this for a date? Scenic, romantic tour around the infirmary hallways."

Brett laughs, putting an arm around Liam gently. "It's pretty good. You taking me out to dinner?"

"Yup." There's a pause. "If by taking you out to dinner you mean ordering a slightly different variation of eggs at five tonight, then yeah. I'm taking you out to dinner."

Brett laughs again. "Well, you're making jokes," he says fondly. "You must be feeling a little better. You doing okay?"

"I'm okay," Liam confirms. "Slow. But it doesn't hurt or anything." He shivers a little. "Man, it's cold in here." 

"Mm." Brett pulls his hoodie closer to Liam's body. "You've got double the amount of fabric you need to keep warm there," he teases Liam lightly. "Just wrap yourself in it twice."

"Fuck you."

Liam goes for two more walks that day, and by the time it hits six, he's fallen asleep sitting up, with his head pillowed awkwardly on Brett's chest.

Tamara comes in to check on him once or twice, but doesn't wake him. Brett's grateful for that. It's not like Liam can get too much sleep.

On the fourth day, Mrs. McCall comes into Liam's room and sits down. "Okay, Liam," she says. "How're you feeling?"

"Good," Liam says sleepily. "Tired." 

"Probably from lying still so much." She reads his chart for a moment. "You're healing up nicely, so we're going to let you go home today. We do need to go over some things first - you aren't on a restricted diet, as such, but we want you to eat foods that have a lot of fat and protein in them. That'll help rebuild your muscles, okay?"

"Okay."

"We're also sending you with instructions on caring for your stitches and how to take your medications. Now, you're not strictly on bed rest, but we do advise that you keep a low profile and try not to do anything strenuous."

"Strenuous?" Liam asks. "Like what?"

"Running, jumping, fighting... sex."

Liam splutters, going red, but Mrs. McCall talks over the top of him. "We want you to lay off on the sexual activity for about a week," she says calmly. "When you come in for a check up we'll let you know if it's okay to resume light sexual activity again."

"Okay," Liam mumbles, his face bright red.

Mrs. McCall smiles as she stands up. "I'll get your things."

"Thank you," Liam mumbles, not looking at her.

The moment she's exited the room, he looks at Brett. "Did you tell her?" he whines.

"We both did," Brett says. "It was on our medical forms. "Are you sexually active" and "have you had intercourse in the last six months". You answered yes. So did I. Considering you'd been on your own until then, they worked it out."

"Sold out by my own dick," Liam mutters. "Does no sex mean strictly no sexual touching of any kind? Or does it mean I can give you head and stuff but not anything else?" 

"Maybe it means I can give you head," Brett says, smiling when Liam tints pink around his ears. 

There are no discharge papers to fill out; Brett helps Liam get dressed, mindful of his surgery site, and then pushes the wheelchair to the front of the infirmary. Liam grumbles about it, says he can walk, and even Dr. Deaton advises that the short walk home will be good for him - get his blood flowing and start to strengthen him again after surgery.

"I've got so many holes in me," Liam mutters.

Brett smiles a little. "Only two more than usual."

"Not true. Three." Liam holds up his right arm; there's a pressure bandage over his elbow, where the saline drip was pumping into him, and one in the back of his hand for the antibiotics. 

"Okay, but the actual surgery site doesn't count," Brett says. "Because it isn't a hole anymore. They stitched you up."

"That just means I've got loads of little holes," Liam says. "And at least I was unconscious for it this time."

They don't talk much after that; Liam sounds kind of winded, and Brett eventually loops an arm around his waist and helps him. Liam smells like antiseptic, a bit like body odour - he hasn't been allowed to shower with his incision, but he also hasn't been moving much. Still, Brett can't wait until he smells like himself again.

They step up onto the porch after about five minutes; Liam winces as they do, and Brett fishes in his pocket for their keys.

"You okay?" Brett asks. Liam's looking frighteningly pale as he leans against their front door, a hand hovering close to his side.

Liam nods once, looking wan and tired. "Yeah." 

"The moment you can't hold down food or you're in too much pain, you're going right back," Brett says. "I mean it."

"I know. I'm okay. Just out of breath."

Brett finally gets the door unlocked and lets them in. There's almost immediately a skittering noise, and Fudge trots around the corner, a welcoming grumble in his throat.

"Gentle, Fudge," Brett murmurs, worried the dog - who must weigh at least ninety, ninety five pounds - will jump on Liam in his excitement and knock him down. 

He doesn't have to. Fudge stops just short of Liam, sticking his muzzle under Liam's outstretched hand, and accepts the affection easily. Soon enough, he's sniffing around Liam's feet and legs, eventually venturing near his side.

"Careful, buddy," Brett says as he helps Liam to the bedroom. Fudge trots along beside them, but stays mostly out of the way. When Liam's on the bed, he jumps up - and Brett's about ready to lurch forward, panicking about Fudge potentially stepping on Liam - but the dog just lies down at Liam's side, after giving the surgery site a cursory sniff, and puts his head on his paws, sighing. 

"Who do you think owned him before?" Brett murmurs as he spreads a blanket over Liam. "They don't learn it out of nowhere." 

Liam shrugs. "Whoever it was, they probably needed loads of help with stuff," he yawns. "Maybe he was a service dog."

"Maybe. Aren't they usually Labradors?" 

"Mhm." Liam strokes Fudge's fur slowly; his eyes are beginning to shut. "Well, I hope they don't miss him too much," he mumbles.

Brett doesn't think they're alive, considering that Liam found Fudge with glass in his paw and pathetically thin from lack of food. Either way, he's grateful they have Fudge now - he's a loyal dog, smart, and Brett feels like he can safely leave Liam on his own to rest with the dog at his side.

Liam's asleep before Brett leaves; just like he'd thought, the drugs have impacted him hard, even despite Tamara and Mrs. McCall doing their best to prevent it. Liam's sensitive to medication, and that's something they have to deal with.

A few times, Brett goes into the room to check on Liam - he's barely even moved, curled on his side with the blankets tucked around him, an arm thrown over Fudge. Fudge isn't sleeping; he's lying with his head on his paws, but his eyes are open and his ears swivel whenever Brett enters the room.

"You watching him?" he asks Fudge softly, and the dog huffs tiredly.

"Good boy." Brett takes one last look at Liam's closed eyes and the steady rise and fall of his chest, then leaves the room.

Now that they have a house and they aren't just surviving, there's actual shit to get done - like cleaning. Brett can't believe that almost three years into the zombie apocalypse, he's got a dog, a live-in boyfriend and his hands in a sink full of soapy dishes, but here he is.

It can't last. He knows that. Something will go to shit. It always does. Always will. But when that happens, they'll be ready. There's no way they won't be - unless it happens in the next few hours and Liam can't move.

Brett's sort of lost when he's finished with the cleaning; he takes a brief shower, even though the water is cold, because that doesn't bother him, and then curls up with a book on the couch. 

Four hours after Liam fell asleep, Brett's alerted to Fudge trotting out of the hallway, pausing at the end to stretch and yawn, showing all his teeth. "Hey, buddy," Brett says. 

"Where's Liam?"

"Right here." Liam enters just behind Fudge; he looks much more alert, and he's moving more easily. "How long did I sleep?"

"About four hours." Brett sits up. "Are you hungry?" he asks. "We have some food around."

"I'm not really, but I'll eat," Liam agrees. Brett's grateful he doesn't have to coax Liam into it - grateful for the surgery, and for Tamara and Mrs. McCall, for the anti-emetics and pain medication that doesn't make Liam sick, for the effort they've gone to to make him as comfortable as possible. 

Brett stands up, putting his book down, and heads over to the cupboards, intent on finding something easy on Liam's stomach - he was still feeling a little nauseous after the surgery, and the oral anti-emetics aren't as potent or as effective as the intravenous ones he was getting. Brett finally settles on some tinned soup and puts it in the microwave, amazed when it whirrs to life.

Liam has his chin on his hand. "Never thought I'd see that again." 

"Me neither." He turns to Liam. "Can I check your bandages?"

"Sure." Liam lifts his shirt up, shivering a little with the cold. There's a thin layer of bandages over the top, but when Brett peels them back, he sees neat, professional sutures, close together and in a straight line, across Liam's torso. There's probably dissolvable stitches in the actual muscles themselves, holding them together so they heal correctly this time around.

"That looks great," Brett murmurs. "They did a good job."

Liam yawns. "Yeah?"  
"Yeah." Brett puts everything back where it was, sitting back guiltily. "Much better than I did."

"I wouldn't say that," Liam says. "You saved my life. Hardly mattered if the stitches looked pretty as long as they held me together, right? That was the idea." 

Brett smiles a little and nods. "Yeah. I suppose. Still, you've got a scar there."

"It was gonna scar anyway. And it doesn't matter anyway. I don't care about scars." 

The microwave beeps; Brett takes the soup out and puts it in front of Liam, who's sitting at the small breakfast bar. There's only room for two stools, but that's all they really need anyway. "Alright. Just try to eat as much as you can."

There's a shuffling noise; Fudge is skittering a little closer, putting his paw up on Liam's knee and whining. Liam smiles. 

"He's hungry."

"I'll feed him too, then, I guess," Brett says, rooting around for some of the cans of dog food they were given. "They're well stocked here."

Liam doesn't answer; Brett's worried before he hears the click of metal against teeth and realise Liam's started eating. He sighs with relief. They weighed Liam before surgery, and Mrs. McCall's kind of worried that Liam's not carrying nearly the amount of weight he could or should be.

None of them are, though - Brett's dropped a good fifteen pounds he couldn't afford, and Stiles looks absolutely emaciated. Still, they've got Liam and Stiles on calorie-dense food, and that should help them. 

Fudge cleans his dog food up in less than a minute, almost inhaling it - Brett puts out another can and some water. By the time he's done all that, Liam's halfway into his soup and not looking like he's gonna stop. The anti-emetics must be working wonders.

"Man," Brett sighs. "I wish we'd had those the first time around."

"Me too," Liam says. "Are you gonna eat?"

Brett takes the hint and gets himself some rabbit meat, sitting down next to Liam. Fudge, apparently satisfied, lies down at their feet with a huff. 

"Feeling okay?" Brett asks.

Liam nods; he's got a mouthful of soup. Once he's swallowed, he says, "Yeah. Kind of sore, but nothing like it was before surgery." 

"Good. Hopefully that means you'll be pain-free once you're healed up." 

Liam nods. "Hey, am I allowed to shower?" he asks. "I forgot what Dr. Deaton said about it."

"I think you are now," Brett says, nodding. "They gave me stuff for your stitches, anyway, to redress them. Do you want one now?"

Liam nods, looking relieved.

"It'll be a cold one," Brett warns.

"I don't care. I just wanna feel human again." 

"Okay," Brett says, nodding. "Yeah. Do you need help getting changed?" Liam's not supposed to be lifting his arms too high, or lifting too much weight. That kind of puts a dampener on some of Brett's plans for their brand new bed, but it's not like they can't fix that later.

"Uh - yeah. A little." Liam doesn't sound that embarrassed; it's just Brett, and he must know that by now.

They head to the bathroom; Fudge follows them dutifully, even if he does seem kind of cranky about how much they're moving around. Once they're in there, Brett helps Liam pull his shirt off over his head, then leans down and unties the drawstrings on Liam's sweats.

"Why the string?" he asks.

"They're too big for me. I lost weight I guess." Liam steadies himself with a hand on Brett's shoulder as he steps out of his clothes; Brett puts them aside, because Liam's pretty much been wearing them consistently over the course of the last few days.

"Try to keep your incision dry," Brett murmurs as he peels the bandages on Liam's side back gently. "As much as you can, anyway. I'll put something on it before another bandage." 

"Sure." Liam turns the knobs on the shower and climbs in, shuddering even as he bravely sticks his head under the water and grabs the shampoo. "I think I need a haircut."

"I like it like that," Brett says. It's slightly longer than average - it's still spiky sometimes, like when Liam's just woken up, but it's beginning to lie a little smoother with the extra weight. Brett thinks he'd like Liam's hair any way he styled it, but if Liam wants to cut it, that's fine.

"Maybe I'll keep it like this, then," Liam says absently, and Brett wonders if Liam's always let other peoples' opinions shape his decisions. 

It's only when Liam climbs out of the shower, shivering, that Brett realises he didn't bring any clothes in, and apparently, neither did Liam. "Wait here," he says quickly.

He scrounges up some sweats, a t-shirt, a pullover, and boxers from their room - their clothes are shoved haphazardly into drawers. It's only when he takes them back to Liam and Liam's pulling on the shirt and pullover that Brett realises he's accidentally given Liam some of his clothes - they stay on him, but the sleeves cover his hands almost completely and display his collarbones.

"These are too big," Liam grumbles. 

"Yeah. They're mine. Sorry."

"Oh." Liam seems decidedly less chagrined after that. He sits down on the toilet seat and holds up the clothes while Brett puts an antibiotic ointment on his stitches, then smooths a new bandage down. By the time he's done, Liam's yawning sleepily.

"You wanna go back to bed?" Brett asks. Surgery is difficult to recover from at the best of times; he knew Liam would be tired.

"No," Liam says stubbornly, then yawns again.

"Well, you wanna join me on the couch, then?" Brett asks. "I was gonna read."

"Okay." Brett's confident enough that Liam will fall asleep once he's comfortable - it doesn't really matter where it is, as long as he's resting, so Brett leads the way to the living room and lies on the couch.

Liam lies down in the tiny gap between the back of the couch and Brett's side, yawning again, as Brett opens the book. It's a new one, one he hasn't read before - Liam picked it up for him.

" _When I stepped out into the bright sunlight from the darkness of the movie house, I had only two things on my mind: Paul Newman, and a ride home_ ," Brett says softly.

"I like this book," Liam mumbles.

"Yeah? Good." Brett clears his throat; Liam's fingers are knotted into his shirt loosely. " _I was wishing I looked like Paul Newman - he looks tough and I don't - but I guess my own looks aren't so bad._ "

"Brett," Liam mumbles.

"Yeah?"

"Who's Paul Newman?" 

"He was an actor in like, the fifties and sixties I think."

"Okay."

" _I have light brown, almost red hair and greenish-gray eyes. I wish they were more grey, because I hate most guys who have green eyes, but I have to be content with what I have_."

He's half expecting Liam to chime in with another comment, but when he looks down, Liam's eyes are closed, and he's breathing slowly, deeply, already asleep. Brett smiles to himself; he knew Liam would rest, whether it was willingly or not.

He reads for half an hour, with Liam sleeping on him, before there's a rap on the door. Liam stirs faintly, but not much; Brett moves out from underneath him gingerly.

Fudge is already at the door, tail wagging and ears pricked up, when Brett reaches it. He looks through the peephole, surprised to see it's Malia and Kira.

He opens the door. "Hi," he says softly.

"Hi." Kira looks hopeful. "We, um, we kind of came to see Liam? We heard about his surgery. How's he doing?"

"He's okay - you wanna come in? I mean, he's sleeping, but he's been sleeping all day, so he'd probably like to do something different."

"What's wrong with him?" Malia asks.

"Just tired I guess. Dunno if you've noticed, but he's kind of highly-strung."

"We noticed," Malia says, and Brett laughs a little. They come inside, and Brett leaves them in the doorway to kick their shoes off - it's raining out there and the ground is slick with mud - as he heads back into the living room.

Liam's blinking his eyes open. "Who needs help?" he mumbles sleepily. 

"Nobody," Brett says fondly, stroking Liam's hair back from his face. "Malia and Kira came to see you."

"To see me? I feel like royalty." Liam stands up, yawning, and pads out to the entrance. "Hi," he says to the girls sleepily.

"Hi, Liam," Kira says, hugging Liam gently. Liam lets her - he's not really that huggy, but he does seem to know that Malia and Kira won't hurt him. Malia steps in to hug him next, a little harder than Kira, complete with a hair ruffle. Liam grumbles something under his breath about her being taller than him, but leaves it alone after that.

"How're you feeling?" Kira asks.

"Tired," Liam says, covering his mouth as he emits another jaw-cracking yawn. "Not sore though. Not really."

"That's good," Malia says. "They told me you're probably gonna be put on my scouting team."

"Really?" Liam actually seems to be happy about that; he looks interested. "When do I start?"

"When you're better I guess." 

Brett's glad Malia will be out there with him at any rate. He knew there was no way they'd put Liam anywhere other than the scouting detail, with his hunting skills and general ability to survive harsh conditions, but he did worry they'd put him with someone unfamiliar. He and Malia have been out hunting together a few times, and they seem to work well together. Malia's taller and a little faster than Liam, but Liam has more brute strength, despite the fact that he's five years younger than her, and can fit into smaller spots. 

"We brought you something," Kira says, then looks at Malia pointedly.

Malia hands it over - it's a book. "What's this?" Liam asks, and then laughs as he turns it over.

A dog training manual. "Perfect," Brett says. "Now he can stop jumping on the bed."

"Our bed is his bed," Liam says firmly. Brett thinks that that's the closest Liam's ever gotten to openly admitting that they're together - people know, for sure, but only through observation. Liam may as well have just said it aloud.

"Liam, he's almost as big as you," Brett points out. "It's like sleeping with a third person."

"It's a big bed!"

"I feel like you've had this conversation before," Malia says. 

"Maybe," Brett says.

"So," Kira says brightly. "How're you guys... feeling about this place?"

"Good," Brett says. "It's nice. Your dad's great."

Kira beams. "That's really good. We were worried that you guys wouldn't like it here and that you'd leave or something. We like you." She turns to Liam. "How're you feeling about it?" she asks, almost carefully.

Liam shrugs. "Nervous. But I'm nervous about everything. I uh, it'll be good to get out and go scouting. When I'm allowed." 

Malia nods. "That's why I do it," she says. "I don't like being around lots of people either." 

So that's how they bonded, Brett thinks. Mutual understanding on how and when to shut the fuck up. That's good. He's glad Liam's got someone who can sympathise with and understand him wholeheartedly.

Malia and Kira come in, stay for a while - they sit close, and Kira's fingers dance over the back of Malia's hand. Whatever they have, it's new, and fragile, but it's something.

_We started like that_ , Brett thinks, looking at Liam. He's sitting with Fudge's head in his lap, stroking the dog's ears. _Fragile. Not now, though. Not after everything._

Kira and Malia leave as the sun begins to set. Liam stands up, wincing a little, and goes to the cupboards to get Fudge's dinner out.

"Ow," he grumbles.

Brett gets the canned food. "Easy," he says. "You might pop your stitches."

Liam sighs, but he does as he's told. Brett knows he's frustrated with being tired and sore - hell, he would be too, especially considering Liam's already used to being in some level of pain and just wants to be done with it. That's the same thing that's making Liam listen to him - the fact that he just doesn't want to hurt anymore. He knows re-injuring the area just means more surgery and a longer recovery time. 

"So," Liam says, yawning again. "You start at the hospital in two days."

Brett nods, feeling pretty nervous. He knows now why they allowed him close to Liam so much, why Mrs. McCall let him watch the x-ray process - they want Brett to work in the med wing. They're giving him two days to stay with Liam, to make sure Liam's alright, but after that...

"What's wrong?" Liam asks curiously. "You'll be great. You have bedside manner and all that shit."

"You realise it's nerve-wracking enough that you've nearly died a thousand times under my watch?" Brett asks. "I mean, you're my boyfriend and I couldn't stop you getting hurt."

"That was my own fault," Liam responds patiently. "You're always telling me not to do anything stupid and then I do it anyway. Even if I know it's stupid. And besides." Liam settles onto a barstool. "Your job isn't to stop people from getting hurt. Your job is to fix them when the people whose jobs it is to stop them from getting hurt fuck up." 

Brett smiles reluctantly. "I suppose."

"You'll be good at it," Liam reassures him. "I mean, you're good with me, right? And I'm pretty fucked up."

"You say it like it's an achievement," Brett murmurs.

Liam tilts his head and smiles a little. "I lived, didn't I?" 

The achievement isn't in the wounds, Brett thinks to himself. It's in surviving them. And he has. 

"You're getting wise in your old age, Li," he says. 

Liam goes pink. "I'm not old," he splutters. "I'm not even eighteen."

"Yeah, that must be coming up soon, right?"

Liam looks at the countertop and picks at a thread on his sweats. "Maybe," he says finally.

"How far away?"

"Not telling."

"Why not?" Brett asks slowly.

"Because," Liam whines. 

"Because why?"

"Because I don't like birthdays."

"You don't - that's bullshit. Everyone likes birthdays. Especially at your age."

"Okay, grandpa," Liam grumbles moodily. "Whatever you say."

Brett reaches out and ruffles Liam's hair. If Liam won't tell him, there's always a way to find out... and if he's spilled the beans to anyone, it'll have been Kira. 

"Food?" Brett asks lightly.

"Okay."

~*~

His first day at the hospital is nerve wracking, to say the least.

It's not even that he's treating anyone; nobody seems to be wounded right now. That really says something about how safe this place really is.

He has to leave Liam alone, first of all, and he's never willingly done that. Liam's still sleeping when Brett climbs out of bed, but he kisses him goodbye anyway, leaving him with Fudge watching attentively. He jumps on the bed when Brett leaves the room.

"Get in a dead man's grave, you would," Brett grumbles as he leaves.

It's interesting, at least. Brett's shown the storerooms, the medical equipment, and the beds. The only patients currently in the infirmary are some of the higher-care elderly people who were assimilated into the community right after its conception. 

At the end of the day, he brain is fried from the sheer amount of information he's required to remember. He drags himself up the steps of the house, wondering what Liam's been doing, if he's been taking his medication and resting properly. 

"Liam?" he calls as he enters.

"Yeah?"

He frowns. 

"In here."

Brett hurries down the hall, hearing Liam's voice from the bathroom. Is he sick? Brett wonders frantically. In pain? Did he fall or pass out? Is-

When he enters, he's greeted with the sight of Liam, kneeling next to the bath and scrubbing Fudge's fur. Fudge looks at Brett, panting lazily, his eyes half-open as Liam rubs his chest. They're both covered in soap bubbles.

"What are you doing?" Brett asks slowly.

Liam turns to give him a flat look. "Really?"

"I can see you're bathing him. But why?"

"He needed a bath." Liam kisses Fudge's snout with a smile. "And he loves it. Look at him. He likes being clean just as much as we do." 

Fudge does look pretty happy about this turn of events, and he is already looking cleaner. "No dirt," Brett notes as Liam works the suds through Fudge's fur. "Was he clean?"

"No." Liam wrinkles his nose. "This is the second time I shampooed him. But he's gonna look so pretty when he's all dried off." With that, Liam picks up the bucket next to him, fills it with water, and dumps it over Fudge's back.

"How long have you been in here?"

"About half an hour." Liam's focussed on draining the tub now. "He needed it. Looks sleepy, though."

Liam's right; the dog does look like he's dozing off after all the attention. Brett smiles a little. He never thought a dog could have personality... but Fudge definitely does.

"You're so clean," Liam coos as he starts to towel Fudge dry. "You smell so nice. You're gonna get all the lady dogs."

"You like him more than me," Brett grumbles.

"Are you really jealous of a dog?" Liam chuckles.

"Will you make fun of me if I say yes?" Brett asks petulantly.

Liam turns to him, smiling. "Only a little. I need a shower now though. Wanna join me? I'll soap you up too."

"Now that, even if it is a bad pick up line, sounds like fun." 

~*~

Liam's idea of "soaping him up" turns out to be sucking Brett off enthusiastically.

Brett can't even complain - Liam's not under the jet of water, so his incisions aren't getting wet, and he seems to be thoroughly enjoying himself, if his dick is anything to go by.   
The idea that Liam gets off on getting Brett off is pretty fucking hot. He's holding Brett's hips - gripping them tightly, really, bobbing his head up and down and looking up every so often like he's trying to check that Brett's having a good time.

Brett's not sure how he could not be having a good time; this is the closest they've been in weeks now, and he's not going to last long. He groans as he knots his fingers into Liam's hair and tugs on it, gently, pushing forward.

Liam hesitates for a moment, and then swallows around his dick; Brett would be embarrassed about the whimper that escapes his mouth, but Liam responds with a similar noise - his eyebrows are drawn together and his dick looks painfully hard. Brett decides he'll take care of that for Liam once they're out of the shower.

He doesn't want Liam to strain his surgery site - it's barely been more than a week, Liam's still on pain medication, and he's only just started to really look truly healthy again. If Brett's dick gets in the way of Liam's recovery, he'll be berating himself for the rest of his life.

Brett sees Liam's hand drift down from his hip. "Don't," he moans. Liam glances up at him, and Brett shakes his head.

Hesitantly, Liam's hand moves back to his thigh, he angles his head, and picks up the pace.

"Oh, shit," Brett moans helplessly. "Liam, I'm gonna-"

The flat of Liam's tongue rasps against the underside of Brett's dick, right on top of a vein, and Brett slams his head back against the shower wall as he comes hard in Liam's mouth, his hands clenched in Liam's hair. Liam makes a muffled sound - something soft and heated and needy - and swallows him down.

When he's finished, Liam pulls away from him and pouts. "Why didn't you let me-"

"Your turn," Brett says, helping Liam to his feet and switching the shower off. "C'mon." 

They towel off very briefly, and soon enough Brett's got Liam right where he wants him - on his back, laid comfortably in the middle of the bed. Brett reaches for the lube, and Liam's eyes follow the movement eagerly.

"You have to lie still, okay?" Brett asks. "And tell me if anything starts to hurt."

"Okay, I promise," Liam says, pulling Brett closer hurriedly. "C'mon." 

Brett slicks up a finger and starts toying with Liam's entrance, watching his dick jump excitedly on his stomach. He bats Liam's hand away when he reaches down to touch himself.

"No touching," he says lightly.

"Hmm." Liam sounds partially sad, but more aroused at being told what to do. He lies there and shivers with anticipation as Brett presses gently against his entrance, then withdraws teasingly. Liam's eyebrows come together.

"Please?" he asks quietly.

Brett groans; he wishes he could get hard again, but it's probably not a good idea to fuck Liam through the mattress when he's still got stitches. He slips the first finger in, up to the second knuckle, as he holds Liam's hip with his other hand.

Liam sighs, squirms for all of a second, and then forces himself to lie still. Brett knows he's teasing but he doesn't care right now; right now all he wants is for Liam to unravel slowly and helplessly beneath Brett's hands.

He has Liam quivering on the edge of movement for almost a whole minute - stroking inside him leisurely and taking note of Liam's facial expressions - before he slides the other finger inside. Liam's body, which was strung tense like a bow, sags in relief, and he closes his eyes.

"One not enough?" Brett murmurs as he leans closer.

"Yeah," Liam breathes, his fingers knotted into the blanket beneath him. "Not sure two is either." 

"Be good and I'll use three." 

Liam makes a soft noise in his throat, moving his hips a little before settling down again, and Brett realises Liam's made the connection that "being good" is lying still. 

"Will you come closer?" Liam breathes out. "I wanna touch you." 

Brett moves in closer, not expecting Liam to lock his legs around his waist. "Promise I'll be still now," Liam whispers.

Brett smiles. "Okay." He leans down to kiss Liam gently, widening his fingers in a scissoring motion and happily swallowing the moan that falls out of Liam's throat. 

He pulls away from Liam for a moment, planting his hand on Liam's outer left thigh and digging his fingers in a little. "You gonna be good?" he asks quietly. He's just testing the waters here, but he didn't fail to notice Liam's eyes light up when he told him to be good. If Liam doesn't respond well, he can back off and try something different.

Liam tips his head to the side, his eyes shy when they meet Brett's. "I'll be good," he says meekly.

Holy shit, Brett thinks, groaning as he pushes in closer. Liam's definitely cottoned on to what he's doing here and definitely likes it, if his response is any indication. 

"Safeword," Brett whispers to Liam.

Liam rolls his eyes. "Oh, come on," he says. "I'm not made of glass-"

"Then think of it as something for my peace of mind and pick one," Brett says quietly.

"Okay. Uh - Tree."

Brett shrugs; whatever works. As long as Liam has a safeword, just in case... and Brett's not going to be rough with him physically, of course not, but Liam's been through a lot and Brett doesn't want him to feel scared or unsafe.

He pushes his fingers deeper, and Liam whimpers as Brett strokes that powerful little bundle of nerves inside him, his legs tensing up. 

"I'll make it easy for you," Brett murmurs. "You just tell me what you want and I'll do it, okay?" 

"Hmm, okay," Liam sighs happily. 

Brett smiles back, feeling weirdly emotional. He's not stupid - after everything Liam's been through, the fact that he even lets Brett touch him, let alone sexually, is a fucking miracle. He's mentioned being hurt by other survivors before - the last people he met before Brett tried to shoot him - and Brett knows that Garrett's treatment of him was less than stellar. Not to mention that Keeper, either. But Liam's here and seems to be without reservations. 

The bedroom door opens, and Brett sees a tail near the bed. "Liam, so help me God," he grumbles, working his fingers around inside Liam's tight passage, "if your dog fucking cockblocks us-"

"Fudge, sit," Liam moans, and the dog does, then lies down with a sigh. "Good boy." 

"Thank God he's well trained," Brett huffs. 

Liam whimpers, lifting his head to look down. "Oh, God," he moans. "What're you doing?"

"What do you mean?" Brett asks, genuinely bemused.

"Doesn't matter, just keep doing it," Liam breathes, letting his head flop back. "Are you gonna fuck me?"

"No. Doc said no sex and I don't want to hurt you." Brett smooths a hand up Liam's belly. "Don't worry; you're still gonna feel good, baby."

Liam swallows. "I like it when you call me that," he breathes.

"What?"

"Baby. I like that name."

Brett smiles. Liam's never said it before, but he's also never told Brett to stop or looked adverse to it, so Brett's just kind of... kept up with it. 

"Hold still," Brett murmurs, shuffling down the bed. Liam watches him, eyes half-lidded and pupils blown wide in the half-light of the bedroom. The sun is beginning to go down. 

Brett manages to hook Liam's legs over his shoulders, relishing in the heat radiating from his thighs and the backs of his knees, and noses teasingly at the junction of Liam's thigh and pelvis. Liam makes a vaguely pleading noise above him, and he trembles, but he doesn't move. 

"Should I?" Brett asks lightly, smoothing his hand up and down Liam's outer thigh.

"Please," Liam whines.

Brett gives his inner thigh a relatively innocent nibble, and Liam's body jerks reflexively; he breathes out something that sounds sort of like an "Oh, fuck," and twists his hands into Brett's hair. "Sorry," he breathes. "Sorry."

"Sensitive there?"

"Like you wouldn't believe," Liam moans. 

Brett's gonna have to start cataloguing all these areas - the back of Liam's neck, his nipples, the peaks of his hipbones, his inner thighs and lower belly... there are plenty of areas that turn Liam into a pile of mush, it would seem.

Brett would love to hold both of Liam's hips, but he can't if he wants to keep stroking that little bundle of nerves inside him, so he settles for gripping Liam's left hip tightly. Liam goes slack, canting his hips up weakly, and Brett realises that his dick is going ignored.

"Sorry," he murmurs, and leans up a little before taking Liam in his mouth gently.

"Oh, shit," Liam groans. "Brett-" 

He hums lightly; there's a vein on the underside of Liam's dick that's pulsing happily against his tongue, and he makes sure to keep pressure on it. 

"Fuck," Liam whimpers, tugging on Brett's hair. He's given up on holding still; his hands are clenching and unclenching and his thighs, around Brett's ears, are quivering chaotically. 

He's close, Brett realises. He uses his free hand to scratch Liam's outer thigh.

Liam whines, pushes his hips up, and then gasps, "Um, Brett-"

Brett arches his neck to get a good angle, aiming right for Liam's sweet spot, and makes sure the flat of his tongue presses against the head of Liam's dick.

The noise Liam makes is more of a cry than anything else, and he comes hard, tugging Brett's hair roughly and digging his heels into Brett's shoulder blades. Brett swallows, thoroughly satisfied with the amount of noise he's hearing.

He doesn't let up until Liam's gone soft and pliant underneath him; only then does he straighten up a little, relieved as the pressure on his spine eases, and smirks at Liam. He's red faced, covered in a light sheen of sweat, looking thoroughly debauched. 

His eyes are smoky when they meet Brett's. "Thanks," he pants weakly.

"No problem." Brett leans back a little, then pulls out of Liam, who makes a face. 

"Hurts?" Brett asks, thumbing lightly at Liam's hip. There are red marks there. He didn't realise he'd held on so hard.

"Not really. Kind of tender. But it's been a while," Liam answers. 

Brett takes in the sight of him; Liam's never been too self conscious about his body post-orgasm, and now's no different. He doesn't seem worried about the fact that Brett's still kneeling between his legs, or that his chest is red and heaving. 

"You need another shower," Brett says.

Liam outright giggles at that; he drags a pillow under his head. "Carry me then," he says, eyes bright. "I'm not walking."

There's a shuffling noise; Fudge's nose appears at the edge of the bed, and then he puts his paws up so he can lick Liam's shoulder.

"Gross," Brett mutters.

"Doesn't matter." Liam looks sleepy; he buries his hand absently in Fudge's ruff. "He didn't cockblock us."

"Only 'cause you told him not to." 

"Like that matters." Liam starts to sit up. "I'm gonna go shower again," he groans.

Brett chuckles. "Oh, you're so hard done by," he teases. "And you started it." 

Liam flips him off, but gets off the bed and heads back to the bathroom. He's in and out in under five minutes - barely enough to clean the sweat off - before he's crawling back under the covers next to Brett with a wide yawn.

Brett crawls under with him. He thinks Liam's fallen asleep before he moves, and his hand lands on the slope of Brett's spine, runs up to his shoulders, scratches the back of his neck lightly, and then repeats the trip. Brett shivers a little.

"I'm glad we came here," Liam mumbles.

Brett smiles. "So am I." 

Liam opens his eyes; they're cloudy with sleep. "Do you reckon this can last?" he murmurs.

"What do you mean?" Brett asks evasively.

"I mean... do you think this can last? River's End, I mean. And the peace. Do you reckon we could... I dunno, if nothing interrupted us, would it be possible to stay here for the rest of our lives?"

Brett thinks about that. In theory, sure, it's entirely possible. That they would just stay in this house for whatever time they have left and protect and contribute to the community. Watch Kira's baby grow up. 

But reality was never that pretty before the apocalypse; something will force them to move eventually. Maybe not even necessarily just them, but the whole community; lack of useable resources, a thinning in the prey population due to hunting, tainted water, a herd of zombies traipsing on through. The Keepers possibly finding them. Any number of things.

And if they do stay... who's to say they'll even be together? Liam's seventeen - nearly eighteen - years old. And Brett remembers how fucking fast things changed when he was that age; how quickly he decided that what he had and what he'd worked his ass off for wasn't actually really what he wanted anymore, how it felt like nobody really knew what he was trying to say.

Liam won't be any different. And Brett might not withstand that test of time. Liam might like him now, but feelings are fleeting things and he's well aware of that.

It's ridiculous for him to want to hear Liam say the words "I love you", as if they'll somehow cement their relationship and prevent either of them from changing their minds. But he wants it anyway; he wants Liam to say it. He's never going to try and manipulate him into it, and he's not sure Liam will ever really know how, but he's going to hope for it. He knows that's how he feels. 

He does have reservations. Liam's seventeen years old and so much has happened to him over the last six months that Brett can't be sure how he'll handle hearing those words. But God does he love this kid. 

"I guess," Brett says softly. "In a perfect world." 

"Doesn't have to be perfect," Liam says, moving a little closer to him. "Just has to be good."

Good. Good, for Brett, means this: a healthy, happy Liam who loves him without reservations, a dog, this house. Not being hurt or sick or in pain. To make it perfect would be to add his mother and sister back into the mix. Liam's family while he's at it, and Mason. 

But he could deal with good. 

~*~

It's almost a week later than Brett's woken up to the sensation of his wrist being inexplicably wet.

He groans, rolls over, and sees Fudge standing by the bed, his jaw closed around Brett's wrist.

Brett's first reaction is to freak out, and he jolts upright, resisting the urge to yank his arm back. It's once he's upright that he realises Fudge isn't biting him or even holding him hard - he's tugging a little, and he's whining.

"What're you doing?" he croaks. "You hungry or something?"

Fudge whines again.

"Liam, your dog is nuts," Brett groans, turning to the other side of the bed.

The covers are thrown back; Liam's side of the bed is empty. Brett's heart stops. "Liam?" he breathes, feeling panic rise up into his throat.

Fudge whines and tugs on Brett's wrist again, and Brett throws the covers back, getting out of bed and intent on finding his boyfriend.

Fudge lets him go and bounds off down the hallway, then pushes the bathroom door open with his snout. Brett follows him, surprised to see Liam sitting on the ground next to the toilet. He looks up tiredly when Brett enters; his eyes are red, and he looks like he might've been crying.

"Liam?" Brett asks.

"Sorry," Liam mumbles. "Didn't wanna wake you up."

"You didn't." Brett gestures at Fudge, who's wound his way under Liam's arm and is licking his neck. "He did."

Liam turns to look at Fudge. "You sold me out," he says, and Fudge licks his cheek. "Ugh."

Brett joins Liam on the floor. "Did the anti-emetics stop working?" he questions softly.

"No," Liam says tiredly. "No, they were working fine. I had a nightmare. Threw up." 

Fudge settles with his head on Liam's leg, his eyes open and looking towards Brett. That's when Brett realises that the dog knew Liam was sick - or, at the very least, that something was amiss - and came to get him.

"Fudge is smart," Brett says.

Liam smiles weakly.

"What'd you dream about?"

"That Keeper." Liam rubs his face. "They're getting more and more vivid and fucked up every night. I think maybe it has something to do with the painkillers. Oh, and the residual trauma of nearly being raped and slaughtered."

Brett winces. He knows the only way for Liam to deal with it is to say it dryly, cynically, but the blasé way he talks about it is hard for Brett to handle. Wrapping Liam in cotton wool isn't going to help him, that much is clear - but damn if that isn't what Brett wants to do.

"Don't know what to say, huh?" Liam asks. He's watching Brett quietly, his hand stroking Fudge's fur, the other one lying across the edge of the shower-tub. 

"Not really," Brett replies quietly.

"That's okay. Me neither. I mean, I wouldn't know what to say to me either." 

Brett gets up and sits down on Liam's other side, puts an arm around his shoulders. "You gonna get sick again?"

"No, probably not," Liam sighs. "I just thought I'd stay in case. Wasn't expecting Fudge to turn me in."

Brett chuckles. "I'm glad he did. I did think he was gnawing my arm off when I woke up. Retribution for not feeding him enough, maybe."

Liam smiles a little, rests his head against Brett's arm, around the back of his neck. "So," he says. "On a scale of one to ten, how fucked up do you think I am?"

Brett shakes his head. "The scale doesn't exist anymore, buddy. We're all fucked up. In different ways, maybe, but you're not any different from anyone else. We all have trauma."

"I am different," Liam says miserably. "Everyone else deals with theirs. I hide in bathrooms." 

Brett shakes his head. "You're dealing," he says. "You're coping a lot better than I thought you might, actually. You can talk about it, and recognise it wasn't your fault - that's coping. Even if you end up hiding in bathrooms. And besides, nobody else knows that. Maybe everyone else does it too and you just don't know." 

Liam nods. There's a long silence, until Fudge starts snoring in Liam's lap.

"Maybe I should start a bathroom support group," Liam says eventually. When Brett looks at him, he's smiling, and so Brett knows it's safe to laugh.

"Maybe." He stands up. "Maybe you should come back to bed first." 

"Okay, okay," Liam grumbles, moving Fudge's head off his leg. "God, you've already fucked me once today, but I suppose, if you really needed to, I could be persuaded..."

"Persuaded," Brett snorts - he's not sure how comfortable he is with the sexually-charged jokes, given what Liam just had a nightmare about, but he goes with it. "You've never needed to be persuaded before."

"That is true."

"Also, it's past midnight," Brett points out. "So I fucked you yesterday. It's tomorrow now."

Liam squints at him. "Huh?"

"Yeah, that was a bad sentence." He shakes his head. "I don't wanna have sex with you right now anyway."

Liam clutches his chest, rolls his eyes, and says, "I'm wounded." 

"Shut up," Brett chuckles. "Get into bed."

"Yes sir." Once Liam's rolled onto his side with a sigh, Brett spoons up behind him, tucking his face into the back of Liam's neck. 

The bed shakes, and Brett groans when a heavy weight settles against his back. "Are you gonna teach him not to jump on the bed?" Brett asks.

"Are you gonna stop being such a fucking killjoy?" Liam snickers.

Brett digs his fingers into Liam's stomach, eliciting a sharp bark of laughter that has Fudge twitching and sitting upright. "Take it back," Brett says.

"Never." Liam laughs again. "Okay, okay. I'll try. Quit it."

Brett stops tickling him, glad to have at least made him laugh. "Loser," he mutters fondly, kissing the back of Liam's neck. "Get some sleep."

"Yeah." Liam's yawning. "Night."

"Night, Liam."

~*~

A familiar smell wakes him up - something between roasting and burning, steam...

He groans. "What?"

When he opens his eyes, he sees that Liam's kneeling beside the bed - Fudge sitting beside him. They're both staring at him, which is a little disconcerting.

"Morning," Liam says.

"Morning," Brett replies sleepily, dragging the covers closer. "How long have you been watching me, you freak?"

"Only a few minutes." There's that smell again. "I brought you something."

"Hmm?" Brett opens his eyes.

Liam's got a mug under his face; Brett sniffs, and that's when he realises what it is. "Coffee," he breathes. "Where did you get coffee?"

"I went down to pick up all our rations," Liam says. "Which included coffee. Mr. Yukimura told me it may as well be gold. I think it's fucking gross, but I know you like it." 

Brett sits up, and Liam hands him the mug. "You're amazing," Brett sighs happily. "Coffee. I haven't had coffee in years. I was trying to quit before the zombies started munching on people. Not now. Wait - you think it's gross?"

"I tried a sip of yours," Liam says, wrinkling his nose.

"Acquired taste. What else did you get?"

"Whatever we were given. They gave us more of the deer and rabbit because they said it was ours in the first place. And they also gave us all the dog food because Fudge is the only dog here. And look." Liam holds up his other hand. "Apples. They grow apples here."

"An apple a day keeps the doctor away," Brett says.

"Might be a bit late for me." Liam stands up. "There's stuff for breakfast," he says sheepishly. "I just... don't know how to cook anything that isn't deer meat or oatmeal."

Brett smiles and passes the mug back to Liam. "I'll make us something. What've we got to work with?"

"Eggs, powdered milk, and oatmeal."

"Fucking oatmeal," Brett sighs. "Okay." 

Liam sinks into the barstool, crunching away on his apple. Brett's hardly surprised to see Fudge at his feet - a little more surprised when Liam tosses the core to him and the dog eats it in less than ten seconds.

"Are you supposed to do that?"

"Apples are good for dogs."

"So what're we doing today?" Brett asks. "Did you find out?"

"Mr. Yukimura said something about skill testing," Liam says. "Sounds boring as shit. They're sending me down to the armoury with Malia and I think you're going to the hospital with Kira."

"And Fudge?"

"They said I could take him as long as he was well behaved."

Brett nods. He's managed to make some scrambled eggs - the electricity times, right now, are between eight and nine in the morning and seven and nine at night. Not much, but enough to get things done if you time it okay.

"You want me to come with you?" he asks quietly. "To the armoury?"

"I'm okay. Mal's gonna be there." Liam closes his eyes and sighs a little. "Fuck, you make amazing eggs."

Brett smiles. "Glad you like them."

He takes Liam in; he looks healthy, and he's regaining weight, and he's moving easily - his side clearly isn't bothering him anymore. He didn't wake up again last night either; Brett can only hope that's a sign that Liam's slowly starting to recover, now that he's been given the chance.

"Don't do anything too rough today," Brett says. "I know you feel great - hell, you look great - but don't risk it, okay?"

"I don't think they'll be getting me to fight hand to hand," Liam says. "But I won't."

Brett's day in the infirmary is a blur. There's a lot to do and even more to learn, and even though Mrs. McCall and Tamara are patient with him, he's still sort of lost. He doesn't see much of Dr. Deaton, either, which he finds odd. 

He doesn't have that much time to ponder it; when he's off his shift, he finds Liam in the lobby area, lying across a couple of chairs.

"Do you sit everywhere like it's your own home?" Brett teases.

"Yup." Liam stands up. "Are you already finished?"

"Yeah. You gonna walk me home?"

Liam scrunches his face up. "I have to come here for a checkup," he says moodily.

"Hey." Brett steps close to him, a hand on Liam's waist; Liam starts smiling, almost unwillingly. "Maybe they'll tell you that you're good for sex again," he whispers.

Liam goes a little pink, then steps away from him as someone enters.

It's Mrs. McCall. "Hi, Liam," she says kindly. "You got the message?"

"Mhm."

"And you're still here." She smiles at Brett. "Well, as long as you are, how about you get some extra training in - you can help me with Liam's check up."

The nurses who have handled Liam seem to know that he deals better with, well, everything when Brett's around. He follows them both down the hallways and sits down in a chair while Liam's instructed to hop onto the exam table.

"Alright, sweetie," Mrs. McCall says cheerfully. "Shirt off."

Liam ditches his hoodie and shirt, shivering a little. Mrs. McCall leans in close to the wound, inspecting it, then has Liam lie down as she probes the area.

"See this?" she asks Brett, motioning him over. He goes, and she puts his hand against Liam's sutures. "If you press a little, you can feel the bridge in the muscle where it was repaired. Right there. See?"

Brett presses curiously, watching as Liam's face screws up. Initially, he thinks he's hurt Liam - until Liam lets out a peal of laughter. Brett had forgotten he was ticklish.

"Well, that's good," Melissa says, looking relieved. "At least he isn't in pain." She motions for Liam to sit up. "Well, I'd say that you can probably resume all your regular activities as long as you take it easy."

Liam perks up. "All of them?" he asks.

She smiles and rolls her eyes. "Yes. All of them. Do I need to tell you boys to be safe?"

"Nobody's getting knocked up here," Liam says, hopping down from the table and ignoring the way Brett blushes. "Thanks, Mrs. McCall." 

After telling Liam to come back to have his stitches removed in three days, she lets them go. Liam almost bounces down the steps to the infirmary; he seems much livelier than he ever has. But he's been sleeping and eating well, and he hasn't been as badly stressed. Being around people still seems to press his buttons, but not to the extent that he can't handle it.

As they're heading home, Liam produces an apple from his pocket - Brett's not sure how he missed that - and bites into it happily. "I haven't had apples in ages," he sighs thickly.

"Chew with your mouth closed," is Brett's absent-minded answer. He's watching the patrol on top of the walls curiously; they don't seem to cover the entire area, and both people look fairly inexperienced with weapons. 

"Brett. Liam."

They both turn around; Liam swears under his breath, muffled, and swallows his bite of apple. It's Sheriff Stilinski.

"Hi," Brett says.

"We need to talk to you," he says quietly. 

~*~

"Liam, isn't it?"

Liam nods, seeming surprised that Logan addressed him. "Yeah."

"And how old are you?"

"Seventeen," Liam mumbles.

"You lived in Ashburton, correct?" he asks, and when Liam nods, says, "how long for?"

"More than a year." Liam looks between them all. "Look, if this is about the hospital there - I don't know much. Probably less than you. I never went there because I figured it'd been overrun early on. I didn't know what was going on there."

"We know," Logan says, surprising both of them. "But we need to get into that city. Scott told us you know the lay of the land there. How well?"

"Every inch," Liam says. "What's going on, though? Why the hell would you wanna go back there? They've got a slave trade set up, dude. And that's the tip of a really big, really fucked up ice cube."

Brett winces. He's hardly surprised Liam called Logan - who seems to be the head of the community - "dude" but it probably isn't the best term to use for him. Logan doesn't seem to mind, though; he even smiles a little.

"What are our chances of getting out undetected?"

"Slim to none." 

"And of avoiding zombies?"

"Well, I mean, they're corralling them at the moment. There aren't any roaming free that I know of. But that doesn't mean they won't be let loose."

"Corralling them?" Sheriff Stilinski asks. "How?"

"I don't know," Liam says.

"Where? How many?"

"I don't know." 

"Let me guess... you also don't know who's responsible for it?" Logan asks.

"I'd say Theo and whoever he's working for, actually, but that's just my opinion," Liam says, and Brett's heart starts beating faster - now's not a good time to get an attitude. "Look, I'll tell you whatever I can, okay? But I don't know much. I kept to myself. I dunno if you noticed but there aren't many people my age left."

That seems to sober everyone at the table up; Liam's right. There are no other teenagers in River's End - none his age, anyway. A few younger ones, maybe twelve or thirteen. But everyone seems to be either five years younger or five years older than Liam. Brett wonders if it's lonely.

"You know how to survive," Logan says, sitting back.

"That I'll admit to."

Logan smiles; Brett's stomach turns uneasily. Liam stares right back at Logan belligerently.

"You should come with us," Logan says.

Liam opens his mouth, but Mrs. McCall beats him to it. "Absolutely not," she says. "He's just had invasive surgery and he's only a teenager. He's a minor. We are not sending him out there."

"Alright," Logan says quietly. But Brett doesn't like this - something about it is all wrong, about the way he's looking at Liam like he's a challenge. Liam, for his part, seems to have realised; his eyes are focussed on Mrs. McCall now. He looks grateful.

He doesn't wanna go back out there, Brett realises. He might be nervous in here, but he still knows it's safer than out there.

"Brett," Logan says. "How're you at surviving?"

"Shit," Liam says, surprising him. "The whole reason we met was because he was starving to death and almost got munched on."

Okay, that's a little offensive. It's on his mind even as Logan questions him about the outside world - most people in this community have been here since the beginning, he explains, and they have no idea who or what is out there anymore. 

Brett tells them what he can, and waits until they're back in the house to say, "I'm not that terrible."

Liam turns to him, eyes soft. "I know, I'm sorry."

"So why so harsh? You really think I'm a load?"

"You know I don't," Liam says. "You've saved my life more times than either of us can count. It's just - if Logan thinks you're pathetic, he won't send you on the scouting team either." 

Brett's floored. Liam's quick insult back there was to protect him. "Thanks," he says.

"I dunno about you," Liam sighs, flopping down on the couch dramatically, "but the last thing I wanna do is go back to Ashburton."

"I'm with you there."

Brett straddles Liam's hips, earning a soft "oof" and a slightly irritated glance. He smiles sweetly.

"So... you're allowed to resume normal activities," he teases.

Liam peers at him, a little smile forming on his lips. "Does this mean you're going to make me do laundry?" he asks innocently.

Brett stands up and pulls Liam upright, starting to lead him to the bedroom. "Only after we make it necessary."

"Oh, you're gross," Liam chuckles, but he's hurrying along eagerly behind Brett.

"You love it." 

~*~

When they started out having sex in their brand new bed, Brett had every intention of fucking Liam ruthlessly - making up for lost time, really. 

But something's changed. Liam's on his back, and he's got his arms around Brett's neck, his legs around Brett's waist and hips, and so far the only noises he's made are quiet, timid whimpers and sighs that sound almost emotional. And Brett's stopped, a few times, to ask if he's alright, but Liam keeps saying he is - that he's fine, to keep going.

Brett knows, almost instinctively, that Liam doesn't want to be pounded right now. He doesn't want it rough. And the way he's got his arms curled around Brett's shoulders - relying on Brett to support his neck and back - makes Brett realise that Liam's thoroughly vulnerable at the moment. All his walls are down. 

Brett thinks - and he's not sure, not really, but he thinks that Liam's like this, right now, because he's finally safe. He's stripped bare - he doesn't have to defend or protect anyone, they aren't surviving by the skin of their teeth, and his trauma is out in the open where they can both see it and feel it and deal with it. Brett's not stupid; that Liam even lets him close is nothing short of a miracle. 

Brett leans back a little, intent on seeing Liam's face. "Feeling good?" he asks quietly.

Liam nods, gives him a small smile - not insincere, just small - and digs his heels into Brett's back a little. Brett leans back in, kisses him, feels Liam's dick straining between their stomachs. 

He feels Liam squeeze, sigh, then relax. "What do you want me to do?" he murmurs.

"Just keep doing what you're doing. It's nice. Unless you want it different."

"I don't." He's actually really enjoying this; he can tell Liam's happy and in a good, if somewhat vulnerable, state right now, and that means more to him than screwing him senseless.

Liam arches his back a little, and Brett shudders as the angle changes and he's sliding in a little deeper. "Liam," he breathes. "I'm gonna come pretty soon."

Liam opens his eyes, then lifts his head so he can kiss Brett softly, but thoroughly, his tongue tangling with Brett's and his sighs melting like hot honey in Brett's throat. 

Brett groans as he feels sparks begin to shoot up and down his lower back and his belly, igniting a wave of heat. "Liam," he whispers urgently. "Liam, I want you to-"

"I will, I promise," Liam breathes back, squeezing Brett's flanks with his thighs. "Can you - a little faster?"

Brett picks up the pace, watching hungrily as Liam bites into his lower lip and reaches down to stroke himself. His head sags back into the pillow behind it.

"Brett," he moans.

Brett tucks his face into Liam's throat and gasps urgently as Liam starts to pulse around him, squeezing him, and then the fireworks in his spine are exploding, leaving him twitching as he comes, hard. He hears Liam make a vague, satisfied noise and moans weakly, dragging his fingernails down Liam's shoulder blades.

He lies on Liam for a while, letting Liam play with his hair and trace patterns into his back. Eventually, he knows he has to move, though; the longer he waits, the stickier they'll be, and the less pleasant pulling out will become.

He leaves Liam gently, disposes of the condom, then comes back to kiss Liam's cheek. "You okay?"

"Mhm," Liam says sleepily. "That was great."

"Yeah?" Brett asks uncertainly. "You were different this time around."

"I know." Liam yawns. "Just didn't want it hard today."

Brett nods. It was somehow more intense anyway, getting to actually enjoy all of it without wondering when someone was going to walk in - having Liam trust him completely like that. Different, but nice. 

He wipes them both clean, and they nap on top of the covers for a while. Brett dozes off and wakes up to the same sight: Liam, sprawled out on his back, face tilted towards Brett, half in shadow. 

He makes dinner - Liam tries to help but he's pretty useless in the kitchen, which results in Brett stepping around him more often than not. After that, he settles in on the couch with a book. Liam goes outside with Fudge.

Brett realises, just as the sun is beginning to go down, that he and Liam have successfully whiled away the day. He never, in a million years, thought that would happen; that he'd spend a relaxed day with his partner. 

The door slides open, and Liam enters, out of breath, with Fudge trailing after him. Brett rolls his eyes silently as Liam fills up a water dish and puts it straight under Fudge's nose. Liam's more whipped by the dog than he ever was Brett.

"Brett," Liam says.

"Mhm?" Brett asks.

Liam comes over, takes his book out of his hands, and sits down on his stomach; Brett grunts with the added weight.

"What's up?" he asks, holding Liam's thighs.

"I'm going on a supply run with Mal and her team," Liam says. "Tomorrow. I just wanted you to know. And we might not be back before dark."

"You're going on a run?" Brett knows he's pulling a face. "This soon?"

"It's been almost a fortnight since my surgery, and I haven't had any pain and I was playing basketball with Scott and Stiles yesterday," Liam says pointedly. "The stitches are ready to come out and I'm moving fine. So they're sending me out. It's just a short one."

"Okay," Brett mumbles.

Liam smiles. "Don't pout. I'll bring you back something to read." 

"A new book?"

"Yup. Whatever you want... that I can find, anyway." 

Brett smiles. "Okay. You taking Fudge?"

"They said not to this time around," Liam says.

"He's gonna go crazy without you."

"So make friends with him," Liam says. "You can't keep fighting over me. It's tearing this family apart." 

Brett laughs.

~*~

It's early when Liam leaves the next morning.

Brett's standing in the kitchen, drinking coffee, when Liam appears wearing all his survivalist gear. He looks well rested, which is a nice change. 

Brett follows him to the front door. "You be careful out there, okay?" he asks quietly. 

"I will be. You know that." 

"Seriously. Don't get bitten."

Liam smiles at him. "Would you relax? We're barely going more than a few miles. It's gonna be fine." He leans up and kisses Brett gently. "Don't have an aneurism while I'm gone. Old man."

"Liam," Brett murmurs, taking Liam's face in his hands. "I'm serious, okay? If something happens to you, I'm not going to know what to do with myself. Please be careful, okay? People get hurt when they get cocky."

Liam blinks once, then nods slowly; Brett can see he's taken the words to heart. "I'll be careful," he promises. "Besides, Malia and Scott are gonna be there anyway."

"Small scouting detail," Brett notes.

"We aren't going far. Normally Stiles comes too - at least that's what Malia said. But he can't because of his leg." 

"Yeah." Stiles came much closer to losing his life than Liam did; he's still finding it difficult to walk and regain weight. It really puts into perspective just how well Liam bounced back.

Brett gives Liam one final kiss goodbye. "Be safe," he says.

"You too." Liam leaves him with a small smile and the lingering smell of shaving cream.

~*~

The first few hours pass quickly; he has to get more training done at the hospital. After that, though, there's not much to do - he throws the ball for Fudge for almost a whole hour, until the dog refuses to chase it anymore and flops down on the kitchen tiles, panting.

Brett puts the water bowl right underneath the dog's face, because that's what Liam would do, and says, "We aren't gonna fight over him anymore, okay?" he asks.

Fudge looks at him.

"Liam," Brett clarifies, and Fudge's ears prick attentively. "Yeah. We aren't gonna fight over him. We're just gonna look after him, okay?"

Fudge gives him a wet lick on the face. Brett groans, takes it as an affirmative, and stands up. He's searching for something to read when there's a knock.

He goes to the door to find Kira standing there, looking a little sheepish, but smiling anyway - she always seems to be.

"Hi," Brett says.

"Hey." She waves awkwardly. "So I know how much it sucks when they go out on a run and you don't know when they'll be back, and I saw you at the hospital today so I know you're done working, and I figured you might be bored or something, so-"

"Wanna go for a walk?" Brett interrupts. It's like whiplash, going from Liam - who isn't really that talkative on a good day and mute on the bad ones - to Kira, who's talkative literally all the time and only gets worse with nerves. 

"Sure," she says cheerfully. "Um, are you good with tools?"

"Liam's better, but I'm okay," he says, feeling a little confused. "Why?"

"I have a baby crib to build," she says ruefully. "I mean, I think I can do it, but... another set of hands would be good."

"I'll help," Brett agrees with a smile. "Can't promise it'll actually look like a crib when we're done, but Liam can fix it."

"Is he good with his hands?"

Brett grins toothily, and she immediately goes red. "I didn't mean like that!" she splutters.

"Yes. Like that, and in the way you actually meant," he snickers. "He's pretty hands-on. Seems to know how to take things apart and put them back together without much trouble. I'm useless at that stuff, but he's alright." 

"Malia told me he fumbled through a lot of the tests," she says quietly.

Brett nods. "I think..."

"He played dumb," Kira finishes. "Malia knows that. She requested him anyway."

Liam's not stupid. People seem to think he is because he's younger than them, but there's a reason he's survived for so long. He knows people. He can read them. And he knows scoring well means an even bigger target on him than what Logan seems to have already.

"What's Logan's deal?" Brett asks Kira.

She looks up at him, wide eyed. "I don't think you should ask me that out here," she admits. "Look, he's just... not the greatest, you know? And he doesn't care that much. Nothing evil or sinister though."

Brett has to agree there; if something was up, Liam would've been outwardly aggressive by now. He isn't, just wary - cautious. He's not a kid.

Not a kid. That reminds him of Liam's birthday; if anyone knows when it is, it'll be Kira.

"Hey, Kira," Brett says. "Do you know when Liam's birthday is?"

She looks immediately nervous. "Uh - no. Well I mean I know he's turning eighteen pretty soon but I'm not really sure, exactly, um-"

"Right. Your poker face is shit." He smiles at her a little. "It's okay if you can't tell me."

"He told me not to because he didn't want you to worry about it," she blurts out. "He doesn't want it to be another thing to add to the list of things you've already got on your mind."

"Sounds like him," Brett says dryly. "You'd think he'd know by now that he's always on my mind, right?" 

She smiles a little. "If I tell you, will you tell him I told you?"

"Of course not." 

"Okay," she says. "It's March sixteenth."

"Jesus, that's close," Brett realises. "Less than five days away."

"Will you do anything for it?"

"Yeah, I've got an idea," Brett says. "I think, anyway. Thanks for letting me know."

They sit in companionable silence for a while. Eventually, Brett turns to Kira.

"How's Junior?"

She rests a hand on her stomach for a moment; her face is sad. "Good," she says quietly. "I ended up telling Scott. He's not really sure what to do. Stiles doesn't like it."

Brett rolls his eyes. "Of course not," he says. He's seen Stiles rub everyone the wrong way - especially Liam, very rarely Scott. Liam has a low tolerance for bullshit and very little experience with curbing his bluntness, though, which Brett's sure exacerbates the problem.

"Do you think-"

"He doesn't have the right to not like it," Brett interrupts. "It's your baby. And Scott's I suppose, but I'm guessing Malia's taken over that role now?" When Kira nods, blushing, Brett sighs. "Thought so. Look, don't worry, okay? Nobody hates babies."

"Some people do."

"Stiles isn't one of those people. He's prickly because he's scared."

She smiles faintly. "Speaking from experience?" 

Brett snorts. "Oh yeah. You know it took Liam a good, oh, six or seven weeks to not be worried about me shanking him? Never mind actually trusting me." 

"He's not that prickly anymore," she points out.

"I think I got the brunt of it," Brett says dryly. "He'd been alone more than a year when I met him. Told me more than once that his social skills were questionable and rusty. Gave me plenty of evidence to back that up, too. He's okay once you get him to talk. He likes you though."

"I didn't do much," Kira says.

"You were gentle with him," Brett says softly. "He's... not used to that." 

She tips her head. "Why not?"

Brett shakes his own head with a quiet sigh. "You know... I don't actually know a whole lot about that year," he says. "I know he arrived in Ashburton after his previous group was destroyed. His ex got bitten and died... Liam put him down. He was fifteen."

Kira covers her mouth. "Oh my God," she whispers.

"Mm. After that he was alone. Tried to help strangers - the last he helped before me tried to shoot him. But that's all I know really. He took a real chance on me. I still don't really know why... he said he could tell I wasn't dangerous, but I'm not sure I believe that."

"You think... maybe he got lonely?" she asks hesitantly. "Like... he'd just been alone for such a long time that he couldn't believe you were a real person and hoped you'd stick around?" 

Brett swallows. He's never considered that. "Maybe." 

She nods. After a moment, she bites her lip and says, "You reckon he'd help with the baby?"

"I don't see why not," Brett says. "He's got a complex where small, defenseless creatures are concerned."

She nods. "I'd feel better if you were both involved," she says nervously. "With Scott and Stiles..."

"Oh, fuck them, seriously," Brett says, irritated. "Maybe not Scott - he'll come around - but not even Stiles can senselessly hate a fucking baby that hasn't even been born yet. We'll be there, okay?"

She smiles.

"So," Brett says, standing up and cracking his spine. "Let's build this crib." 

~*~

The sun's already set when Brett shows up for his allocated six-hour shift at the hospital.

He feels pretty anxious; Liam said they mightn't be back before nightfall, but damn if he isn't fucking scared about that. Liam was always the one who insisted on getting back to their apartment before nightfall and never leaving before sunrise. He's gotta be nervous.

They have him running tests all night. He's bored as hell until there's a knock on the door, and someone says, "Brett."

Brett looks up; Tamara's smiling at him.

"The scouting team is back," she says. "This is usually when we do tests to make sure they're alright. There's one patient in particular I could use a helping hand with."

Brett turns around properly. "Liam?" he worries. "Is he hurt?"

"He's got a nasty scrape on his arm, but he's not seriously hurt," Tamara reassures him. "I'm just understaffed and Liam knows you." 

He follows her; Liam, Malia and Scott are standing in the hallway. Liam's halfway through a huge yawn when Brett approaches and touches his shoulder.

Liam starts, but when he sees it's Brett, his face splits into a smile. "Hi."

"Hi." Brett smiles back fondly reaches out to touch Liam's neck. "Are you hurt?"

Liam holds up his left arm sleepily; there's a bloody scrape on his elbow and forearm. "Mostly I'm just sleepy," he admits.

Brett's about to reply when Tamara taps his shoulder awkwardly. "Here's a list of the procedures you're meant to do when they come in," she says, passing Brett a sheet of paper. "And you're meant to get a debriefing from them too."

Thorough, Brett notes, and nods. "Okay, will do." He looks at Liam. "C'mon." 

Liam follows him into one of the exam rooms, where Brett promptly turns around, takes his face, and kisses him deeply. He feels Liam smiling against his mouth, tonguing at his lips eagerly; that's when Brett has to cut it short.

He pulls away slowly. "I'm not fucking you in a doctor's office," he whispers, and Liam grins impishly.

"Why not?"

"Because people will hear us," Brett chuckles. "Up."

Liam dumps his stuff on the ground and hops onto the exam table, swinging his legs a little. Brett looks at the list.

"Jesus," he says, raising his eyebrows.

"What?" 

"There's about half a million things on here," Brett murmurs. "Okay, well, I guess we'd better get started, right?" 

There's a myriad of tests. The first up is a cheek swab, then a light reaction test - Brett assumes that's to look for concussions. Liam flinches from the light the first time around, but Brett gets to watch his pupils constrict down to pinpricks on the second, and he marvels at the pure, icy blue of Liam's eyes.

"You might wanna lie down for this one," Brett says.

"What? Why? What - aw, fuck. Can't you skip that one?" Liam whines as Brett produces a needle and a vial.

"Nope. This is probably the most important one." He comes closer, tying a tourniquet around Liam's arm. "You gonna lie down?"

"No," Liam mutters stubbornly.

"Alright," Brett says, shrugging. "Suit yourself." He flicks Liam's vein a little.

"How often have you done this?" Liam asks nervously.

"A few times now. Don't worry, I'll only have to stick you once."

Liam loses a little colour in his face, and Brett realises the phrase "stick you" is probably not very comforting for him to hear. "I mean draw blood," he amends quickly.

"Keep digging the hole. You're almost in China."

"Very funny." Liam's vein has finally come up; Brett inserts the needle, then unties the tourniquet and puts it to the side. 

When he looks up, Liam seems a little woozy; his eyes are half shut. "Hey," Brett says, snapping his fingers. "Don't look at your arm. Look at me, okay?" 

Liam takes a deep breath and looks up at Brett. "I really hate needles," he breathes.

"I know." Brett draws the blood as swiftly as he can, then removes the needle. "But you're done. So it doesn't matter now anyway. Good job."

"I didn't do anything." 

"You know you can be told "good job" for doing something you're scared of doing, right?" Brett asks, looking up at Liam. Liam looks back at him blankly before his face crunches in a jaw-breaking yawn.

Brett smiles. "Sleepy, huh?"

"Mm."

"Not much longer." He cleans up Liam's arm, puts a pressure bandage over the needle site, and puts the vial aside. "You have to debrief me," he reminds Liam. 

Liam smirks slyly. "Yes sir."

"Jesus, Liam," he chuckles fondly. "The sooner you debrief me, you can actually debrief me... in bed." He reaches for some antiseptic spray and a light bandage. "Spill. How'd this happen?"

Liam's eyes flash uncertainly. "I fell," he lies.

Brett's about to call him on it as he wipes the scrape clean and sprays it, but something tells him that Liam's not lying to him for the sake of sparing his feelings. "Yeah, you're sort of a klutz like that," he says casually, when that statement couldn't be further from the truth.

Other than that, Liam simply tells him that they spent the day looting the area; they've already dropped everything off at the inventory room for the most part. Brett smooths the bandage down gently.

"I'm not bleeding that badly," Liam says.

"I know. It's just to stop dirt getting into it." Brett stands. "Okay, you're done." 

"Are you coming home with me?" Liam asks hopefully. 

"I've still got a few hours here," Brett says apologetically. "Head home, okay? Take a shower, eat something, go to sleep. I'll be there when you wake up."

Liam reluctantly follows his advice and leaves; Brett spends the night learning how to interpret samples with Tamara and Mrs. McCall before they let him and a bunch of other "students" go.

He's relieved to be out of there. When he gets back, there's a few candles lit on the counter top, and a note.

_I found this today. Seems like your thing. Nerd._

He smiles as he picks the book up; it's a thick hardcover, inside a case emblazoned with a simple, large, ornate letter S.

He takes the slip cover off and opens it, surprised but intrigued to find bits of paper sticking out of the book. Upon further inspection, they look like they belong there. He looks at the spine.

"Ship Of Theseus," he murmurs. "Hmm." 

"Did I do good?"

He turns; Liam's standing in the hallway, looking sleep-tousled, but happy to find him at home. Fudge is at his ankles, of course. 

"Yeah, it looks great." He puts it down, blows out the candles, and goes over to Liam, hustling him back into the hallway. "Thought I told you to go back to sleep?"

Liam yawns; he's toasty and warm from the bed. "You did, Mom," he says innocently. "I was sleeping until you came in." 

Brett smiles to himself. "Yeah. Okay." He strips everything off and climbs into bed; Liam's lying on his back, eyes already shut.

Brett rolls over to him and tucks himself up close. Usually it's Liam using Brett as a pillow, but Brett's not gonna pretend he doesn't occasionally enjoy a role reversal.

"Liam," he says softly.

"Mhm."

"How'd you scrape your arm?"

Liam's eyes drift open blearily. "Found people," he says.

"You what?" Brett asks.

"There was a car wreck." Liam rolls onto his side and tucks his face awkwardly against Brett's neck. "We tried to pull them out, but they died, mostly. We got one lady out. Stayed with her until... yeah."

Brett closes his eyes. "Sorry you had to see that," he murmurs.

"Mm. That's how I scraped my arm."

"So why the secrecy?"

"Logan doesn't want us to help people." Liam's voice is quiet and sleepy. "He says it's a strategic advantage if we know things they don't. Malia and Scott don't agree with that. Neither do I, obviously. That's why Mal requested me for her team."

Brett nods. "Yeah. Hey, you must be exhausted. Go to sleep." He kisses Liam's chin gently. "You'll feel a little better in the morning."

"Mhm," Liam murmurs. "G'night."

"Night, Liam." 

~*~

When he wakes up, it's just barely getting light.

He guesses it's around seven, maybe seven thirty. Liam's still passed out cold next to him, his scraped arm curled on Brett's chest. Fudge is snoring.

Brett makes breakfast, trying to keep quiet, and then goes back to the bedroom. Fudge lifts his head and sniffs excitedly.

"It's not for you," he says. "You didn't go out scouting last night."

Fudge whines.

"Okay, fine," Brett says, tossing him a strip of deer meat. "But only because Liam will be mad at me if I don't share with you."

With that, he sits on the bed and reaches out to shake Liam's shoulder gently. Liam blinks his eyes open sleepily.

"Morning," Brett says softly, smiling.

"Hi," Liam says drowsily. "Is that breakfast?"

"Yep. You better eat it before Fudge does."

"Did you give him some?" Liam sits up a little, clumsily using his right hand to spear some deer meat. Brett rolls his eyes.

"I gave him some." Fudge is whining. "Hey! I gave you some! God, playing the field, huh?"

Liam laughs a little. 

Brett sighs, looking at him. "Still thinking about it, huh?" he asks softly.

Liam shrugs. "We didn't get there in time. I mean, I've hardly ever gotten there in time to help someone, but... it still feels shitty."

Brett closes his eyes. "It was good of you," he murmurs softly. "To do what you did. And stay with her until she'd... gone." He readjusts on the bed. "Finish eating, okay?" 

"Okay." Liam sits up properly and digs into his food, eyes still mostly closed, with Fudge watching him hopefully. 

"This dog is the most hopelessly pathetic creature alive," Brett says, but he reaches out to stroke Fudge's ears as he says it. "That's why you like him. He's literally too sad to say no to." 

Liam smiles. "Reminds me of someone else, more like."

"Who?" Brett asks, mystified, and Liam shakes his head. "Hey!"

Liam laughs, leaning back in the bed - he's done with his plate and leaves it on the bedside table. "I'm just kidding," he says fondly, reaching out to stroke Brett's forearm. "But he did remind me of you."

"Yeah?" Brett grumbles.

"He was hungry, skinny, hurt, and probably would've died if I'd left him there," Liam says. "He did growl at me though. Can't say you did that... or that you've ever done that."

Liam tries to save every stray he sees, whether they're human or not. Brett likes that about him; somehow, Liam's gone through all this and not become cold or hard as ice. 

"Brett?"

Brett looks at Liam curiously; he looks sort of nervous.

"Don't ask me why," he says uncomfortably. "Or tell anyone I mentioned it. But... be careful around Logan, okay? Please?"

Brett nods slowly. "Okay," he says, confused. "I will." 

"Cool." Then Liam's getting out of bed. "Shower?"

"Be there soon," Brett murmurs.

_What the hell was that all about?_


	21. Chapter Twenty One - Ticking Clock

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is where things get rough. Sorry in advance - but this chapter is 18k so don't kill me maybe? :3  
>  **Trigger warnings for this chapter: mentions of past abuse/alcoholism, and gore at the end of the chapter.**  
>  Thanks to everyone who read/commented/kudo'd last time! Also, this story has officially passed the 200k word mark.  
> Enjoy! <3

**Chapter Twenty One - Ticking Clock  
Liam's P.O.V**

"You stay here," Liam whispers, kneeling down to stroke Fudge's ears. "Take care of Brett for me. Okay?"

Fudge whines quietly and licks Liam's face.

"Good boy."

With that, he stands up, grabs an apple from the fruit bowl, and leaves quietly, locking the door behind him and stuffing his key down the neck of his shirt. He's a little nervous about leaving - not because he thinks it's gonna go badly, or that he can't do it, but because he's not sure how Brett's going to do without him - how he's gonna do without Brett.  
Still, it's only a two-night scouting trip. He'll be back before he really knows it, and he's gonna be with Malia and Scott anyway.

He knows the rules by now: Malia is the leader of their scouting group. He takes his orders from her. If something happens to Malia, Scott takes charge. If something happens to Scott... run like hell. 

When he gets to the gates, he's surprised to see Stiles standing there. "Hey," he says.

"Nobody told me you were coming," Stiles says.

"Nobody told me _you_ were coming," Liam says waspishly. "What about your leg?"

"It's better," Stiles says. "Well. Apart from having a huge chunk of flesh missing from where your lovely boyfriend scraped away like sandpaper on a block of wood-"

"He saved your life," Liam snaps. "Try being more grateful." 

Stiles glares at him for a moment, and Liam glares right back. Sometimes, he can deal with Stiles, and sometimes he can't - it's looking like today is one of those days that's going to test the upper limits of his patience. 

"So... you're gay," Stiles says awkwardly.

Liam stares at him. "Yeah... when did you notice?" 

"Try not being a sarcastic little twerp and hear me out," Stiles says. 

"Well, now that you've called me a fucking twerp, you motherfu-"

"How do I get Scott to sleep with me?" Stiles interrupts him.

Liam blinks with surprise, then grins slyly. "Oh, so that's what this is about? Getting Scott into bed?" He sniggers as he watches Stiles squirm. "You know, you could've completely skipped the five minutes of being a dick and just asked me."

"Would you have answered?" Stiles asks dryly.

"Sure." Liam shrugs. "I dunno if anyone's told you but there's no one size fits all when it comes to getting anyone to fuck you. Are you guys, I dunno, together?" 

"See that's the thing, Liam - I don't know!" Stiles splutters. "We've - kissed and stuff-"

"You're acting like a teenager," Liam says bluntly. "And that's coming from me." 

"Okay, fine. We've kissed, and we've been sleeping in the same bed, but nothing else has happened. Not that I don't want it to. I do. I just don't know how to make it happen."

Liam tilts his head. "Do you want to fuck him or do you wanna ask him out?"

"... Both?"

"Well, why don't you just tell him?" Liam asks. "Instead of coming up with some huge elaborate plan, why don't you just tell him that you want to wine, dine and bang him?" 

"Sex on the first date? Really?"

Liam shrugs. "Don't see why not. Plus, you know, with the munchers walking around, you never know if you're gonna get another chance, so you may as well. As long as you both want to that is."

"Are you going to lecture me on consent?" Stiles asks disbelievingly.

"Dude, you lectured me on safe sex more than once when we were in Warranwood," Liam replies flatly. "I wanna get some of my own back."

"Okay, but what about Kira?" Stiles asks.

"What about her?" Liam mutters coldly. He knows Stiles has been less than nice after finding out about her pregnancy. 

"Just - I don't know!" Stiles splutters. "The baby is Scott's. And that just makes it - well, I mean, Kira probably still wants-"

"Kira's with Malia," Liam interrupts. 

"Wh - really?"

"Yeah."

"As in-"

"Getting each other off, or whatever it is girls do," Liam says.

"Whatever it is girls do? Have you never seen a girl's-"

"No," Liam says flatly. "Dude. What part of "gay" don't you understand?" 

"You were never questioning?"

"No. I knew I was gay. Getting a handjob from one of my best friends under the dining room table when I was fourteen just kind of sealed the deal for me."

Stiles' jaw drops. "Does Brett know about this?" he hisses.

"Brett knows my fucking blood type. He knows everything about me." Liam holds up his hands. "Dude, I can't teach you how to be gay." 

"Oh come on, please? You sound like you've have plenty of practice and an early start," Stiles begs. 

"... Did you just call me a slut?" 

"Please, Liam?" Stiles begs. "C'mon, I'll sweeten the deal."

"I... don't think I want to know what you mean by sweetening the deal," Liam mutters apprehensively.

"Not like that! C'mon, dude. Be my Yoda."

"Again with the fucking Star Wars references. I haven't seen it!" 

"Which is nothing short of a tragedy, but won't stop me making references about it. Be my Yoda, Liam. My Yoda be."

Liam rolls his eyes. "What do you want me to tell you?" he asks blankly. "How to woo Scott? I wouldn't know."

"What do you mean you wouldn't know?"

"I've never approached anyone. They've always approached me. I do literally none of the work." 

"... I hate you, Liam."

Liam shrugs and smiles innocently. 

Malia and Scott turn up a few minutes later, looking way too alert considering the hour. 

"So," he says to Malia, hurrying to her side. "What're the rules, Boss?"

She grins at the name. "Don't do anything dumb," she says, "and trust your instincts."

"That I can do," he says.

They roam close ish, but far enough away from each other than they couldn't all be targets for one person. Liam sticks close to the trees, listening carefully for any biters. 

Their first stop is a massive Target complex, seven hours out from River's End. Liam's happy to get there - his legs are tired. He used to be able to walk further than that and not be exhausted, but his stamina still isn't back to normal after his surgery.

They have lists of things to work off, but Liam's also been instructed to find some more things for him and Brett - clothes and blankets, mostly, because the winters last longer here and they didn't bring that much with them. Liam fills up on that stuff, ties blankets and whole duvets into bundles he can carry on his back.

When he's done, he heads to the medicine aisle - a quick search reveals some painkillers, generic ibuprofen, mostly, and even some anti-emetics. He takes those pretty quick, then looks around a little more.

It pays off; he soon finds some more prenatal vitamins and snags them off the shelves. He knows he should report them with the rest of the goods... but maybe there's a way to swing giving them just to Kira, without anyone else noticing.

"Liam."

He looks up; Scott's point at the book aisle. "Does Brett like reading?"

"Yeah, he's a huge fucking nerd," Liam says. "Why?"

"I've got some room in my pack," Scott says, smiling. "You wanna pick out some stuff for him? I'll carry it." 

Liam can't help but smile back. "Thanks. He'll like that. Why though?" 

"He saved my life," Scott says, shrugging. "And then Stiles'."

Liam nods. "Yeah. He's saved my ass a few times too." With that, he starts going through the books; Scott follows him. "Yeah?" Liam asks.

"Has... Logan talked to you?"

Liam turns to Scott, narrowing his eyes. "He took us both aside to question us about Ashburton," he says. "He wanted me to go on a scout team there because I know the area. Your mom stopped him. Why?"

"Look, he's..." Scott looks nervous. "You can't tell anyone this, okay? Not even Brett."

_I don't keep secrets from Brett_ , Liam thinks uneasily, but he says, "Okay."

"He's our leader," Scott says. "But the other council members - they don't want him in there. He got voted in but the community is beginning to realise that's a mistake. He's shifted most of the focus away from sustaining what we have and expanding - maybe even into other people's territories."

Liam almost immediately puts two and two together. "He doesn't want to go to Ashburton to get your people back," he says slowly. "He wants to take it over."

"Which is-"

"A fucking suicide mission." Liam's stomach turns; maybe River's End isn't as safe as he thought.

"Listen, that's sort of why we're out here," Scott says lowly. "Malia told him we'd need two nights to make the trip, maybe more, to find the supplies we needed. But we - look, we're looking for evidence of Oakridge."

"Why?" Liam asks slowly. 

"If they're friendly, maybe we can ask for help," Scott says. "Begin to trade with them. If they aren't, we need to know what we could be up against."

"Ask for help from people who, for all you know, could be worse?" Liam asks. 

"Worse?"

"Oh, come on. Don't tell me Stiles hasn't thought of this," Liam says. "What happens if Oakridge isn't the fucking utopia every survivor and their damn dog thinks it is? One of the reasons I didn't want Brett to get set on finding it is because I'm not convinced they're good people, Scott. Keeping a community that size under control would take one hell of an iron-fisted leader." 

"He mentioned it," Scott murmurs. "But they can't be worse than Logan."

"Just how bad is Logan, Scott?"

"He used to be some sort of military guy," Scott murmurs. "Well, that's what he says. Stiles thinks he's lying. Anyway, lately he's been sending out more and more scout parties, trying to establish some of the buildings around the area, get more walls built. We've had casualties."

"How many casualties?" Liam demands.

"So far? Almost twenty. I know it doesn't seem like a lot, but the previous guy we had in - that was sort of head of the council, that is - he only lost two in about a year and a half. Logan's been in for about three months now."

"That's a high death toll for a community your size," Liam comments.

"Look, you don't need to know anymore about him right now," Scott says. "But the fact that you're seventeen and that he's already got you on a scouting detail, two weeks after having surgery, should tell you enough about him." 

"Scott, wait," Liam says.

Scott turns back to him.

"If Logan doesn't know you're looking for Oakridge, then who told you to?" Liam asks. "Because I was told to take orders from Malia, and from you if something happened to her."

Scott hesitates. "A few of the council members have decided it's important," he says. "They chose this scouting team because we have ties to the main council. That's why you were put with us - you're probably one of the most skilled people we have at River's End now. You and Brett."

"God help you all," Liam comments. "Look, I know how to survive. But Brett's the one with the plans that work. I can't plan."

"That's why Malia's here," Scott says with a small smile. "She's good at planning. Take your orders from her and you'll be fine." 

"Guys."

They look up. Malia's standing at the end of the aisle. "You told him?" she asks Scott.

"Yeah. He knows."

"Good." She drops her pack. "Scott, you and Stiles set up camp here - I'm gonna take Liam ahead. See what we can find. If you see the flare, you know what to do." 

"Right." 

Liam follows Malia's lead, dropping most of the stuff he's collected from his pack and only keeping the food and water inside. It's a careful balance between weapons and other supplies, to do this, but he assumes they aren't going very far. 

"What are we looking for?" he asks.

"Any signs of other people," Malia says, and when he opens his mouth again, she smiles and says, "hey, you know what to do. You have good instincts. Just don't go too far from here, okay?"

"Yeah." With that, he sets off, in no particular direction. He wonders, idly, what they'll do even if they do find evidence of Oakridge. 

If it exists - and for Liam, that's a pretty huge if - there's sure as shit no sign of it anywhere. If they find evidence of it, how the fuck are they supposed to get there? And if it is real, and filled with five hundred something people, then they must have fucking awesome defences.

A group that big doesn't get that way without letting people in, Liam reminds himself, setting off after a set of indistinct tracks. So they have to have some kind of criteria for admitting people. Like River's End.

But River's End admittance criteria is a bit shit, he has to admit. Even with four people vouching for them, it should have been harder for them to get in - especially given that there was no extended psych evaluation for them. He finds it kind of odd that they did a blood test, like they were looking for something.

But that's not his business and they have a place to stay for a bit, anyway - and they fixed his side, which, apart from some post-surgery soreness, has been painless. 

He pauses. The tracks are human, which normally wouldn't give him reason to hesitate - human tracks are usually just zombie trails now, after all - but these footsteps are bloody and clearly spaced apart.

Whoever it is, they're alive.

~*~

_He wakes up when the sun rises and welcomes himself to day four hundred and seventy seven of his existence._

_He starts his routine. Up, out of bed, dressed, eats breakfast. Has some tea because it's cold and he's shivering._

_He paces around the bedroom for a while, staring at the newspaper clippings on the walls. Millions of faces and fires and bombings and scenes of carnage he never bore witness to in person. He might be the only one alive now to remember._

_He heads out when the sun has cleared the lowest skyscraper, following his usual path to the tram tracks. He stops on the way to collect water to purify, finds a few tins of food hiding behind a counter in a convenience store. There's always something useful if you look hard enough._

_He's only been out for half an hour before he notices prints._

_He stops, looks around, but he can't see any more, which means he's probably stumbled upon them by chance. They're human, and they're evenly spaced enough that they couldn't possibly be from a walker._

_He chews his lip for a moment. Then he starts off after them; he's got a crossbow and it's becoming more and more apparent that this person is on their own. The tracks give them away - and the distant muttering Liam can hear. He wonders uneasily if the person's crazy - all signs are pointing to yes so far._

_He follows them for hours, occasionally stopping to loot some stores - this has lead him into an unfamiliar part of town. He knows it, but not well. It's been on his looting list for ages._

_The sound of glass shattering grabs his attention, and he breaks into a run, going straight for the noise. He doesn't think before he drops the four or five zombies surrounding the person; it's only in the aftermath that he remembers they might not be friendly._

_He only feels a little regret when he swings the bat into their head, knocking them out cold. Then he stops to look._

_A guy. A really hot guy, too - he's got scruff on his face and he looks tired and kind of skinny, but he's good-looking, and Liam hesitates for a moment. He's... maybe twenty, maybe a little older. Hard to tell really. He doesn't look crazy - but the really insane ones never do._

_He doesn't look good. When Liam pat-searches him, he feels the soft, squishy bloat of hunger in the guy's stomach, notices the dark circles under his eyes. He's not carrying anything either. Not good, then._

_He might not want to hurt me, he thinks. Maybe I can just... drag him to safety and leave._

_So he does. Well, he does the first part - he drags the guy to a safer area of town, then pauses before leaving, because... well, maybe he should wait. Leaving now could mean the guy gets munched on and Liam would feel pretty bad if that happened._

_He ignores the stupidly hopeful part of his soul that's praying to high heaven that this guy is friendly. Or kind. Maybe even both. He'd like company, but nobody ever comes out this way unless they're trying to go somewhere else, or lost._

_The sun is beginning to lower when the guy groans and moves a little. Liam holds up his crossbow, arranging his expression so he looks cold - threatening. It doesn't come all that naturally to him, really, to look like that - he might be crabby and irritable and generally not people-safe, but he's also not that dangerous._

_He watches warily as the guy sits up, slowly, blinking blearily. His expression becomes startled the moment he realises he doesn't know where he is._

_Liam backs up a few steps as the guy gets to his feet and - keeping his voice pitched low - says, "Easy."_

_The guy's smart enough to turn around slowly. He's got really blue eyes, Liam realises. And a lot of very white teeth. White teeth generally means some kind of community - the luxury of having the time to engage in personal hygiene. But nobody came for the guy, and he doesn't seem to have anything. So what?_

_"Hi," the guy says, his voice feeble._

_Liam's so surprised by the simple hello that he doesn't know what to do - so he circles around, until he's a little closer and standing in front of the guy. He's shaking minutely, and he looks really wrung out._

_Liam kneels down and grabs one of his bottles of clean water, rolls it towards the guy with his foot, his crossbow still trained right between the eyes._

_The guy takes the water bottle, stares at it for a moment, then looks up. "What's this?" he asks hesitantly._

_"What's it look like?" Liam responds. He doesn't have to effect the growl to his voice anymore; either this guy is dumb as hell or playing him, and Liam's got no tolerance for either. The tone has the desired effect, anyway; the guy looks sufficiently intimidated by him._

_"Thanks," he croaks, and then drinks. Liam watches, absolutely not looking at the way his throat moves as he gulps the water down._

_"You hit me pretty hard," he says._

_"Not as hard as I could have," Liam fires back._

_The guy blinks once. There's a long pause, and then, slowly, "Crossbow."_

_Definitely dumb, Liam thinks, raising his left eyebrow. Or I hit him too hard. "Good job," he replies. "Glad we've got that sorted."_

_"You killed those zombies, didn't you?" When Liam nods, the dude looks absolutely perplexed. "Why?"_

_"Because they were gonna eat you?" Liam asks slowly, like he's explaining something exceptionally simple to someone very, very stupid._

_The guy rubs his head with a groan. "Did you have to knock me out?"_

_Yes, Liam thinks moodily, but he just shrugs and doesn't say anything. That doesn't seem to deter the other guy; he follows up the first question with a second, saying, "You've been following me all day, haven't you? Stalking is illegal, you know."_

_"It's the zombie apocalypse," Liam replies. "Nothing is illegal anymore."_

_The guy nods like he agrees. Liam supposes he must've seen some shit if he's lived this long, so that makes sense. "So why the love tap?" he asks, gesturing at Liam's baseball bat. "Seems kind of extreme."_

_It kind of is, but Liam doesn't let on that he agrees; he edges a tiny bit closer. "Had to make sure you weren't packing."_

_Another rub on the back of the head. If he's trying to make Liam feel sorry for him, it's not working. "I'm not."_

_"Uh huh," Liam says, rolling his eyes. "That's what they all say. Where're the rest of your group? You can't have come here alone." Someone, somewhere, must be with him, stocking all their supplies._

_"I did."_

_Liam narrows his eyes; he doesn't believe that for a fucking second. How would this guy have even gotten here on his own if he's as dumb as he seems? "What're you doing here?" he demands._

_The dude looks around, uneasily, shoving his hands in his pockets. "Passing through. Just trying to get somewhere."_

_"Where?" Liam asks. He's kind of curious; maybe if he's trying to get somewhere, he really is actually alone._

_"It's a place called Oakridge." He's being careful now; his speech is slow and calculated. "Have you heard of it?"_

_He's heard of places. Groups of survivors. There's even rumours of safe zones and communities that have protection to offer, who aren't psychotic. But he's never heard of that particular place; he shakes his head warily._

_"Supposedly it's a camp for survivors," the guy fills in. "They take people in. I'm looking for a few buddies of mine and I think they might've gone that way."_

_So that's where his friends are, Liam thinks. But he's looking for them? So they ditched him. Why? Just a load, or is he dangerous? He can't help but be interested; he's never heard of this place before, and the idea that actual directions exist is intriguing, even if he finds the idea of people abhorrent._

_"How long have you been on your own?" the guy asks gently._

_"None of your business," Liam snaps, even as he's wondering how the guy knew that - even as the number four hundred and seventy seven flashes into his head. "How'd you get separated from your friends?"_

_"A herd. I was with a few other people, but they..."_

_He trails off. Liam knows this part of the story all too well - everyone has the same one, more or less - but he still asks, "Did they turn?"_

_He shrugs. "I guess you could say that. Although they turned on each other and me before they got bitten and killed." Liam nods at that; people are more trouble than they're fucking worth. "I was the only one who made it out I think. I've been on my own since then, just trying to find my way to Oakridge. This seemed like the most direct path through."_

_Liam stares at him. The only one who made it out; it makes sense now that he hasn't got much on him. He's been too busy running for his life to actually scavenge._

_He realises he's been staring, and that the guy looks uncomfortable, so he speaks. "This was the fastest way through," he admits. "The military collapsed most of the tunnels out of the city. You can get in, but you can't get out - unless you go back the way you came and circle around."_

_Fuck, he hates being the bearer of bad news; the guy looks shattered at the prospect of having to turn back, of a dead end. "That would take weeks," he protests. "Winter will be here by then."_

_"I didn't say it would be easy," Liam replies pointedly._

_He watches as the guy rubs his face, then the back of his neck, obviously distressed. He's shivering pretty obviously now - he's not really dressed for the weather - and he looks fucking wrecked. And Liam knows what happens in winter; that flu shit that goes around is a thousand times worse than what it was with modern medicine, and exposure might force the walkers into being slow and dormant, but it does the same for people, killing through exposure and hunger._

_"Ugh," he mutters. "Okay, what's your deal?" he demands. "Where's your food? Your pack? Supplies? Seriously-" Because he fucking pat-checked this guy and there was no sign of anything anywhere on him - "where are you hiding it all?"_

_"I don't have anything," the guy says quietly. "Sorry to disappoint."_

_I wasn't gonna fucking loot you, Liam thinks, irritated. Ungrateful prick. "You didn't. Although it's kind of fucked up that you've survived this long by winging it." Seriously, he's out busting his balls every day just to make it another second that he's not even sure he wants because he doesn't know how to give it up already - he can't believe sheer luck has kept this idiot alive._

_But still. He doesn't seem like a bad person... dumb, maybe, unskilled, but not bad. Liam doesn't want him to starve. Not with people waiting for him on the other side._

_He lowers his crossbow. "I have three knives and two handguns on me," he says, which isn't a lie, "if you attack me I will fucking kill you, I swear to God." Which is a lie. Maybe the biggest he's ever told. He couldn't do that. Not again. Not after Garrett._

_He takes a can and some of his deer meat out of his bag and slides them over. "Here," he mutters. "Take this."_

_This time, the guy catches them with his foot and picks them up. "What's this?"_

_"Food, idiot," Liam says, exasperated. First with not recognising water, and now food? Maybe that's why he's almost dead. "You're welcome by the way."_

_He leans down and scoops his pack up, then sighs. "Head south," he says brusquely. "There's a tunnel out of the city. It'll take you a few days to trek there but it's the fastest way out I know of. Stay low during the day." This guy needs all the instruction and help he can get. "Move at night. I'm not the only person in this city." And the Keepers sure as shit won't think he's useful._

_"Hey!" the guy calls._

_Liam turns back, surprised._

_"Where's your group?" the dude asks._

_Liam thinks of Garrett, dead before reanimation with a bullet between his eyes and Liam's heart shattered at his feet. Of Owen, who tried so hard to amputate quickly, so that Garrett might live, albeit disabled. Vinnie, who went on a supply run for meds that were never going to work and didn't come back._

_"I don't have one," he replies waspishly. "Not that it's any of your business."_

_"Why didn't you kill me?" Liam raises his eyebrows; the dude is finally mad at him._

_He thinks about it, though. Why didn't he kill the guy? He could've. Or he could've just let him die, true neutral style. But he's not threatening and hasn't been since he woke up, even though Liam pretty much attacked him first._

_"You didn't give me a reason to," he says softly._

_The guy looks down at the package of meat in his hands, then back up at Liam. "You wanna come with me?"_

_Liam scoffs. "What?"_

_"To Oakridge. You wanna come with me?" He's gotta be crazy, Liam decides. "How come you haven't left the city before now? You know the way out-"_

_"I'm waiting for someone," Liam interrupts, rubbing his face. Eventually, he sighs and looks back; he can't just... leave the guy here in the middle of the night. "If you really don't know the way out, I can show you how to get there in the morning. But it's too late to go that far right now."_

_"That... would be good, actually," the guy says, obviously surprised. "So... will we just meet back here in the morning, then?"_

_No weapons. No supplies, other than what I gave him. No blanket or anything. "You got anything to make a fire with?"_

_"No," the guy says sheepishly._

_"Of course you don't," Liam mutters. His mind's made up; he just prays he doesn't end up dead for it. "Follow me. And remember, I'll kill you if you give me a reason to."_

_They're sitting by the fire, hours later, when the guy clears his throat._

_"My name's Brett," he says with a small smile._

_Liam hesitates. Now that he has a name, he has someone to miss when the guy - Brett - inevitably leaves or dies._

_He looks down. "I'm Liam," he replies softly._

_Brett's smile widens. "Hi, Liam," he says. "Thanks for not killing me."_

_Liam likes the way Brett talks. Too bad it won't last._

~*~

He knows he's not supposed to wander far.

But all he can think is _if I hadn't followed Brett when I did that day, he'd be dead_ , and if there's even a remote chance this person might be like Brett - kind and gentle and loving - then he has to fucking try. And that means not wasting time with finding Malia. 

Don't do anything dumb and trust your instincts. Those were the only two ground rules she gave him, and his instincts are telling him that it's dumb to waste time trying to find her. He might be taking creative liberties with the rules, though.

The tracks are clear, concise; he's alarmed to see that there's more than one set. Maybe he should have brought Malia with him. 

"Liam?"

Fuck. He winces; she's totally realised he's gone, judging by the way she just called out to him. He doesn't answer; he really wants to keep following the footprints.

He's really not expecting to round a car - his head is down, looking at the prints - and have a can whipped at his head so fast he barely ducks in time. 

"Get back!" the woman yells. "I'm fast!"

Liam raises his crossbow. "I'm faster." 

Then he hesitates. She's bleeding, and the man and little girl behind her are as well. They all look emaciated, thin. And they're alive. 

He lowers his crossbow. "I'm not gonna hurt you," he says slowly. "You didn't have to fling a can at me... but I won't take it personally."

"Liam?!"

He turns as Malia rounds the corner. "Are you okay?" she pants. "I told you not to go far."

"I'm okay. Narrowly missed out on traumatic brain injury, thanks to a well-aimed can, but I'm okay." He turns back to the people; the little girl has barely stirred from where she's lying in her father's arms. 

Malia pauses, long enough for Stiles and Scott to suddenly join them - they must've been gone longer than Liam thought, considering they were meant to be staying put.

"Where did you come from?" Malia asks.

The woman shakes her head. "It's gone now," she murmurs, clearly exhausted. "It doesn't matter."

"Where are you going?" 

Liam knows the drill by now, but he's so surprised to see living people he'd forgotten. What are your names. Where did you come from. Where are you going. Malia says she always asks them. It's the easiest way to spot liars.

"Oakridge," the woman says.

"Oakridge?" Malia asks. "That's what we're looking for too."

"Yeah," the woman says softly. "Well. We were." 

"Were? You gave up?"

There's a pause, and then she shows her arm. There's a massive bite mark on it. "They have them too," she says quietly, gesturing to the man and little girl. "But don't... don't say it aloud, okay? She doesn't..."

She doesn't know the bite turns people. Liam closes his eyes. 

"Alright," Malia says quietly. "Can you tell us what you know about Oakridge?"

"The only thing we heard is that it's towards DC," the woman says. We thought we'd have more time to find it." 

That isn't particularly new information. Liam files it away anyway; not everyone can be wrong about Oakridge being near DC, surely?

"Look, we just wanted to... to find somewhere peaceful," she says. "So that we could end it. So if it doesn't matter to you..."

"You should eat something," Liam says.

She looks at him, surprised. "Why?"

"I'm sure your daughter's hungry, right?" Liam asks. 

"We all are," the man says. "We don't have anything though." 

Liam swings his bag off his back and begins to open it. "Liam," Stiles hisses. "What're you-"

Scott joins him on the ground, and soon enough they've produced some meat and canned beans. Liam hands them over to her, uncomfortable with the way her eyes well up with tears. 

"Thank you," she whispers.

"Anytime." He backs off to join Malia; Stiles shoots him and Scott an irritated look.

"They're going to bite it soon anyway," he whisper-hisses to them. "What was the point in wasting our food?"

"You don't get it, do you?" Liam asks tiredly.

Malia approaches the woman quietly. "We can do it," she says softly.

"Do what?"

Malia stares back at her, and the woman swallows, then nods.

"Give us... a few minutes." 

Malia looks at Stiles. "Go find us a spot to camp for the night," she says. "Scott, go with him."

"What about Liam?" 

Malia looks at him. "It's up to you."

"I'm staying here," he says. He makes eye contact with the woman as he does - she was probably really pretty before the disease and the famine and, well, the apocalypse happened.

She fishes in her pocket and produces a photo. "Will you take this?" she asks.

He does. It's a photo of her and her family - much happier times, judging by how young their daughter is in it.

"You said you were looking for Oakridge too," she says with a faint smile. "If you find it, can you leave it there? Someplace nice? At least then we sort of made it, you know?" 

Liam's throat closes over. He nods, tries to smile, and stands up, making sure to tuck the picture safely into his jeans. 

"Liam."

He looks up. Malia's eyes are concerned when they land on him, and then soft - understanding. "Go with Stiles," she says softly. "Make sure he's okay."

He looks back at the family. "Malia-"

"You don't have to see this," she interrupts. "It's a one-person job. I've got it covered. Just - watch Stiles and Scott for me, okay? Make sure they don't do anything stupid."

"I-"

"Liam, you're a kid," she whispers to him. "I know you've been doing this for a while, but - can you just take pity on me and let me protect you? Just from this one thing? I'm gonna do it fast. They won't suffer. You won't hear anything. But I need to know that I kept you out of danger." 

Liam wonders if she's handling him with kid gloves because Brett asked her to, or because she somehow knows of his PTSD - but Malia's not the kind of person who would take someone else's opinions on his mental health over his own. She might not be soft and gentle the way Kira is, but she makes up for it in how fiercely protective she is. 

He nods. "Okay."

Her face melts with relief. "Okay. Watch out for the other two for me."

"I will. Malia."

She turns back to him. 

Liam hesitates for a moment, then steps forward and hugs her, somewhat awkwardly - she's a good five inches taller than him and seems to be mostly legs, and she's a little awkward about the sudden hug, but she does put her arms around him.

"Thanks," Liam says quietly.

She nods. Liam's not stupid; Malia doesn't like this either. Hates it, probably, if she's anything like anyone else. But she'd rather do it and have to deal with it than have anyone else suffering because of it, and Liam admires that. 

He just wishes she'd been there for Garrett.

~*~

_"Vinnie's not back yet."_

_Liam looks up from Garrett's face; Owen's standing near the door, alternating between pacing and standing completely still, like a statue. Liam doesn't know what to say to him._

_Since Garrett got bitten, everything's gone straight to hell - so quickly Liam hasn't fully processed it yet. Half the group wanted to leave the sewers and try to escape to the ground; Liam heard them screaming. Vinnie's gone on a run to try and get Garrett medicine._

_He looks terrible, and he's drifting in and out of consciousness, but none of them are doctors and they can't tell whether it's because he's lost so much blood due to amputation or whether the amputation didn't actually work._

_Liam's praying it's just blood loss. Garrett is all he knows; it felt like a miracle to find him after he escaped the hospital, and he's been so grateful just to have him that he's completely pushed all his shitty behaviour aside. He kind of wishes Garrett was a little... maybe softer, or gentler, or just more understanding. But he's not like that, and until now Liam's just been happy to have something familiar._

_It's different now. It changed in that two minutes - loving people means losing them. Loving people means having something to lose and Liam's only just realised that he can't lose Garrett. He can't even comprehend the idea - he tried thinking about it, before, to prepare himself for what might happen. His vision went grey with panic and he almost fainted._

_He's not built for the fucking apocalypse. He's too small and too afraid - too timid. He's fifteen, but he's barely scraping five foot two on a good day and he doesn't have the raw muscle mass or strength that all the full-grown men in his group do. He's not a survivor - he's a burden._

_Owen and Vinnie don't treat him like that, though. They try to give him things to do - things that he can do. He might be afraid of everything that moves, but he's good at cleaning weapons, and Owen's started teaching him basic survival stuff - how to make indoor fires, which Liam didn't know was a thing, and how to treat animal meat so that it would dry up and last way longer, so that bringing down a deer for one person isn't a waste._

_He looks down at the stump of Garrett's arm; his gorge rises threateningly. They've lopped it off just beneath the elbow and Garrett can still move the joint and it's fucking freaky as hell - Liam keeps going to hold his hand, and there's nothing there._

_"If he lives, he's gonna be relying on us for the rest of his life," Owen says to Liam softly._

_Liam shoots Owen a watery glare - he's been trying not to cry, but he hasn't been very successful. "When he lives," he replies._

_Owen looks at him sadly. Then he straightens up off the wall and sighs._

_"I'm gonna go look for Vinnie," he says._

_"Owen-"_

_"You'll be fine," Owen says simply. He picks up his crossbow, in the corner, and passes it over to Liam. "Here."_

_"Don't you-"_

_"I'll take a gun. This is quiet. Doesn't have as much kickback on it - you should be able to use it, buddy. Just be careful, okay? Make sure it's actually a zombie before you shoot."_

_"Owen-"_

_Owen straightens up and smiles shakily. "I'll be back soon, okay, buddy? Just watch out for Garrett. Don't do anything stupid, and don't get munched on."_

_Liam nods. "Okay," he croaks._

~*~

Malia's right; he doesn't hear anything.

In fact, what he doesn't hear is what alerts him to the fact that she's done it. The murmuring of voices stops entirely, and the silence makes Liam's heart pulse rapidly inside his chest, a bird beating its wings in a frantic attempt to escape its cage. 

"Has she done it yet?" Stiles asks Scott lowly. 

"I dunno, man. Maybe, it-"

"She's done it," Liam says.

They both turn to him. "How the hell do you know that?" Stiles demands.

"Can you hear voices?" Liam asks softly.

There's a long pause; Scott rubs his face and sits down with his head in his hands. Stiles just closes his eyes.

It's almost ten minutes before Malia reappears; her eyes are red, but she's walking with her shoulders back and Liam can't help but admire her for being strong even when she wants to be weak. It's a choice, he knows that - he also knows it's a hard choice to make.

"Let's go," she says. 

Liam falls into step beside her silently. He's not gonna make her talk, and he's not going to say anything - he doesn't know what to say, really - but he can be here, at least. So she isn't as alone.

"They thanked us for the food," Malia says quietly.

Liam nods wordlessly.

"That was good of you. To give them food even though we knew... yeah. Don't listen to Stiles, okay? It wasn't a waste. He's just too practical for his own good."

Liam wonders if any of them know the difference between practical and heartless. And in this case, he's not really sure that doing the right thing is going to soothe the fact that he was the only one who thought to. Who wanted to. Maybe it even hurts more.

"Liam?" Malia asks softly. "You okay?"

"I'm okay," he responds automatically. 

"Alright." She sighs. "You know what? Fuck this. We're going home."

~*~

_Liam's not sure how, but they make it out of the sewers and into an apartment building._

_One day. He waited for one day but Owen and Vinnie didn't come back, and they can't stay down there forever - and maybe on the surface, someone could find them and help them._

_Garrett's spent most of his time muttering incoherently - he's turning kind of grey. And Liam knows what that means. It isn't blood loss, or even infection - the bite took.  
Two minutes. Liam's devastated but trying not to think about it. Two minutes. If he'd gotten Garrett back even a few seconds faster, then maybe..._

_But he didn't. And he has to live with that. Or maybe he won't - maybe he can't. He's suddenly staring down the inevitable fact that he's about to lose the one person left he knows, who he loves, who has at least claimed to love him._

_He's not sure how to make Garrett comfortable. He gives him Tylenol, even though that's the last of it, and tries to get him to drink some water. Garrett throws up all over himself, so Liam changes him, somewhat awkwardly, and cleans him up._

_"Liam."_

_His head snaps up; Garrett's eyes are open, looking at him, but the colour is already fading._

_"Are you okay?" Garrett asks groggily._

_"Yeah. I'm fine. I'm not hurt."_

_"I'm sorry, Liam. The sewers. I should've..."_

_"It doesn't matter," Liam hurries to say._

_"It does," Garrett moans. "The bite - the amputation didn't work, did it?"_

_Liam's stomach rolls. Garrett's last few days are going to be spent delirious with pain because of the amputation and the fever - he doesn't even get to go peacefully. "I don't know," he lies._

_"You gotta get out of here, Li," Garrett croaks. "Don't stay around, okay? You have to leave here. Ashburton - it's not far. It's meant to be safe. You go soon, you'll make it before winter. You'll be okay there. Maybe find some people."_

_"How do you know it's safe?"_

_"They had it on the radio... right before it all went to shit. Meant to be okay there. There's infected... but not many."_

_Liam's throat closes over. "I can't."_

_"Liam-"_

_"I can't. I don't - people aren't - please don't..."_

_Garrett makes a weak sobbing noise. "I don't think I have a choice."_

_This is the worst. Liam can quite factually state that. This is literally the worst day of his life. Garrett's going to die, they both know it, and neither of them are ready for it. He's scared, he's in pain, and there's nothing Liam can do to make it stop._

_Liam crawls over to the wall and sits down next to Garrett, pulls him in close, and holds him tight. They're both shaking, and Liam can't tell who's worse. Garrett smells like death, like blood - everything that Liam associates with the infected. The biters._

_"You need to go," Garrett whispers._

_"No."_

_"I can do it, Liam. I'll do it."_

_"You can't-"_

_"Yeah. You can't. I'm going either way."_

_Liam can't help but be stung at that, because he knows it's true - having to put Garrett down would probably wreck him._

_"I'm not going," he says. "You shouldn't be alone."_

_"It's not going to fucking matter," Garrett moans, twisting under Liam's arm. "Whether you're here or not. I'm going to die anyway."_

_In all the movies he's watched, the infected go out in a blaze of glory, usually taking at least a dozen zombies with them, protecting their friends and family in the process and at peace with their fate. There's nothing glorious about this._

_"Why don't you sleep?" Liam asks, his voice breaking._

_"No."_

_"It can't hurt."_

_"Well it isn't gonna help, either."_

_"Please?" Liam begs, his voice breaking. "Maybe you'll feel better when you wake up."_

_Garrett doesn't answer, but he does close his eyes - within a few minutes he's out, his breathing shallow. Liam stares down at his bloody, greying face for almost half an hour before moving._

_He goes outside briefly to piss. Eats a powerbar. Does inventory. Paces. Hours pass._

_He's not sure what tips him off. Maybe it's the sudden, strange silence, or the distinct lack of any movement, autonomous or otherwise, from Garrett. But Liam's suddenly aware that something's not right._

_He turns to Garrett, his ears ringing. His chest isn't moving._

_"Garrett?" Liam whines, his voice snapping._

_No answer. Liam kneels in front of him, puts his hand against Garrett's neck._

_His vision gets black spots and there's an enormous roaring in his ears, his heart pounding, his breaths shortening with an impending panic attack. Garrett's stopped breathing. He doesn't know when it happened, but Garrett's not breathing and his skin is already cooling down._

_"Garrett," Liam moans. "C'mon, please. Please..."_

_There's no answer, of course. Liam sits back, his eyes streaming, trying to suppress the urge to fling himself off the closest building._

_I can't let him turn._

_He forces himself to pick up Garrett's gun, shaking. And it takes him another five minutes to aim it, even though he knows he doesn't have the time - Garrett could reanimate any second now, and if he moves, Liam's gonna lose his nerve._

_He's not sure when he pulls the trigger, doesn't hear the gun go off. He's suddenly standing there with the gun in his hand and there's a hole right through the middle of Garrett's forehead, blood splatters all over the wall behind him._

_That's when Liam collapses and has his panic attack._

~*~

"Liam?"

He opens his eyes. Tamara's standing in front of him, her hand on his arm, looking worried. He blinks and sits up a little.

"Just one more test, okay, chicken?" she asks softly, using one hand to push his hair off his forehead. "Then you can go home and rest."

He nods tiredly. "Chicken?"

"Sorry." She smiles a little. "I used to call my son that." 

"You have a son?"

"Had," she says quietly.

Liam nods. He knows all about "had" and "used to" and "before". There's such a stark disparity between Before and After it feels like he's in an alternate universe, where everything is incredibly shitty all the time and he's being punished by watching the people he loves die. 

"Sorry about your son."

"Thanks." She preps a needle; Liam's vision swims abruptly, and he feels himself listing to the side. 

She props him up quickly. "Lie down for this one, okay?"

He wants to beg her to just let him go and somehow fake the results, but he knows she can't do that and that he'll only be putting her in a bad position by asking. So he lies back on the exam table and looks away as he feels the needle enter his arm, then, after a few moments, withdraw. He wishes Brett was working.

"Good job," she says, patting his forearm. 

"What're you looking for when you do that?" he asks.

"Oh, lots of things. Mostly to see if you've been bitten and infected - people lie about it. We've had it happen before. They think they'll survive somehow, or they go into denial about it. Now we take blood tests of everyone who comes back." 

"Smart," Liam says. He sits up again when she motions for him to. "You're a doctor, right?"

"Right." 

"What kind of doctor?"

She smiles. "A medical doctor - I think you mean my specialisation?" When Liam nods, she continues. "Infectious diseases and neurology. I've done work in intensive care units and had a job lined up with the CDC before this all started."

"That's awesome," Liam says. "So... do you think... well, is there a way anyone can survive this thing? Or a cure?"

"There might be," she says. "From what I can tell, the virus that causes people to reanimate is a lot like rabies."

"There was no rabies cure," Liam says - he remembers his mom panicking when he was a kid and taking him to get a rabies vaccine when he was bitten by a dog. "Just a vaccine. Right?"

"There was no proven cure," she says. "Although a doctor in Wisconsin did once successfully treat a teenage girl who was symptomatic of rabies. The treatment only worked another five or six times though, and it was argued that those survivors already had some kind of genetic immunity." 

Liam nods again. He's tired, but listening as she checks his throat and mouth. 

"In theory, I guess, we could use the Milwaukee protocol to treat the zombie virus," she muses as she puts a stethoscope on Liam's chest. "Not that we exactly have willing subjects. And the zombie virus is different in a lot of ways. Having said that, there were reports from South Africa, in the early days, that some people had been cured. They were never substantiated, though." 

"Have you tried it here?"

"No," she says idly. "We haven't had many bite victims. And when we have... well, usually when they get brought back to us, it's far too late to do anything but try to make them comfortable. Everything is dependent on how quickly the disease spreads to the brain." She tilts her head. "Are you feeling alright?"

"Tired," Liam replies.

"Hmm. Open your mouth again."

He does; she puts her finger on his tongue and presses down, shining a torch into the back of his throat. "Your throat's red," she murmurs. "A little puffy. But you said you're feeling alright."

"Yeah. I'm okay."

"Alright. You can hop down now. If anything shows up in your blood tests, I'll let you know - but it's more than likely you're just a little under the weather." She smiles at him when he picks his things up. "Plenty of water and rest, okay?"

"I will. Thanks, Tamara." 

"No problem, chicken." 

When he exits the room, Malia's waiting outside for him. His place is on the way to hers, and she doesn't like letting him go alone. He feels like he should be walking her home, but she's way more stubborn than he is - which is saying something.

"All clear?"

"Yeah. Let's go."

As they walk, Malia says to him, keeping her voice quiet, "Don't tell Brett about the people we found, alright?"

"What? Why not?"

"Listen... nobody can know we're looking for Oakridge," she says quietly. "It's for his safety, Liam. If Logan finds out what we're doing, he's going to be furious - and he'll be asking every single partner and family member of the scouting teams how much they know. The less they do, the better."

Liam nods; that makes enough sense. Plus, if he tells Brett they're looking for Oakridge, and that they keep finding people who know about it... he doesn't wanna get Brett's hopes up. Not when it could amount to nothing, or at least nothing good.

"I won't." 

"Thanks, Liam."

They don't talk the rest of the way back, but Malia ruffles his hair when he gets to his and Brett's house before leaving. He heads up the steps, feeling a thousand times heavier with exhaustion, and unlocks the door.

Brett's left a candle burning on the kitchen counter for him; Liam smiles as he dumps his pack next to the door before taking all the looted books out and putting them on the table. Then he drops exhaustedly into the barstool at the kitchen counter.

His eyes feel dry and itchy; he rubs them briefly, staring ahead, mindless to the sweat and grime of the last few days on his skin. 

He thinks about Brett. About Logan, and what he's doing to this place - what he wants done to this place.

_Brett can't know_ , he thinks to himself. _He needs to stay here. At least for a while. The travelling was driving him crazy. If we have to leave again..._

Liam doesn't want to think about it. He stands up and begins stripping his clothes off. He's going to keep this from Brett - for Brett's own good. Even if it makes him uncomfortable. 

The shower water is cold, but it doesn't matter - he cleans off quickly and climbs into a pair of boxers before brushing his teeth, half-asleep in the bathroom mirror, and then heading down the hallway. He's careful to be quiet as he cracks open the door to their bedroom.

Brett's soundly asleep, on his side of the bed. Fudge is at the end of the bed, his head on Liam's side. He lifts it and whines eagerly when Liam enters.

"Hey, boy," Liam whispers, smiling as he strokes Fudge's ears. "Shh. You take care of him for me?"

Fudge gives the palm of his hand a brief, affectionate lick.

"Good boy." Liam climbs in next to Brett and pulls the covers up; Fudge resettles against his back, boxing him in safely. Liam tosses an arm over Brett's waist, glad not to have woken him. 

"Night," he murmurs to Brett.

~*~

"Liam."

Liam groans a little and opens his eyes. He feels fucking hungover from lack of sleep. What time did he get in last night?

It doesn't matter. When he blinks his eyes open reluctantly, Brett is smiling down at him softly. His hand is stroking Liam's waist.

Liam smiles sleepily. "Hi."

"Hi, buddy." Brett settles a little better on the bed as Liam yawns hazily and stretches. "You should've woken me up."

"I just went straight to bed," Liam yawns. He moves clumsily to hold Brett when Brett leans over and scoops his torso and shoulders up in a tight hug. "Hmm," he sighs. "I could wake up like this I guess."

"You guess?" Brett teases. "How do I seal the deal?"

"Breakfast in bed," Liam says drowsily. "Um, sorry, I think I just drooled on you."

"You're disgusting," Brett chuckles, but leans back. "You're in luck. I did make you breakfast."

That's when Liam sees the plate on the bedside table behind him. "Oh my God," he says, rolling onto his belly wriggling forward. "You're the best."

"You could sit up," Brett teases.

Liam takes a bite of scrambled egg and closes his eyes with a moan. "Do you know," he says, taking another mouthful, "how fucking awful reconstituted milk powder and protein meal packs taste together?"

Brett puts his hand under Liam's jaw and closes it with a gentle smile. "Chew with your mouth closed," he admonishes. "And I don't. Hopefully I'll never have to. But I figured you probably didn't eat that well out there. What'd you find?"

Liam swallows - with some difficulty, given how much food was actually in his mouth - and says, "Lotsa stuff. Uh, my pack's out in the living room. Got orders to find us some shit for around here, some clothes."

"That's good. We don't have a lot to work with."

Liam knows that; he's lost a few of his clothes because of the damage caused to them by injury, and more often than not, he ends up in Brett's sweaters and shirts... not that he can really say he minds that much. He likes wearing Brett's clothes, even if he does pretty much drown in them.

He swallows another bite of egg, a little slower this time, because he's not as famished. Brett's leaving the room to grab Liam's pack; it's only now dawning to Liam, looking around, that this is their house.

The closet doors are open; the few clothes they do have are hanging up in there, and they have every blanket in the place piled on the bed, except for the ones Fudge sleeps on. Liam blinks. He never, in a thousand years, thought he would end up like this.

Truth be told, he didn't think about much at all, let alone the future, before he met Brett. Before Brett, his life was an endless and somewhat meaningless cycle of waking up, eating, surviving by whatever means necessary, and then going back to bed. The only thought he gave to the future was the distant and frighteningly comforting ideation that eventually, he was going to check himself out.

He shudders at the thought. If he'd done that... there wouldn't be this. Any of this. No Brett or Fudge, no house, no community. Even if the sheer amount of people does make him freak the fuck out most of the time. Even if he is still having nightmares and panic attacks with no mantra of survival to offset them - no _need to hunt, need to find food, need to keep warm, need to patch up the hole and purify the water and take medicine so I don't get sick and cover my tracks and watch out for biters and look for people and wait, and wait, and wait._

"Liam?"

Liam blinks, looking up at Brett. He's standing at the edge of the bed, looking concerned, holding Liam's pack.

"Yeah?"

"You okay? You looked like you were disassociating." 

"I uh - no," Liam says, blinking again. "No, I was actually thinking about everything. Without wigging out for once."

"Oh." Brett looks surprised. "Progress, right?"

"Yeah." Liam keeps eating as Brett unties all the blankets from his pack and tosses them onto the end of the bed. "Thanks for breakfast," he says with a sigh. "I didn't realise how fucking hungry I was. I just kind of came in and showered and went to sleep."

"Yeah, you were pretty knocked out," Brett agrees. "Hey, what's this?"

He's lifting out the three books Liam picked out for him. "Oh," Liam says. "We raided a huge Target store. Had some room in my pack, so I thought I'd get you some more books. I know you've got loads, but you'll probably read them faster now that we aren't, you know, fighting just to survive."

Brett's smiling softly, running his fingers over the covers. "Infinite Jest," he murmurs. "I always meant to read this." 

"Okay, Captain Nerd," Liam says, rolling his eyes. "But I flicked through it and it sounds really fucking complicated, so you can read that one yourself."

"House Of Leaves isn't a walk in the park either," Brett points out.

"Why do you think I give it to you whenever it gets fucked up?" Liam chuckles.

"Oh, nice." Brett puts everything aside. "Did you check in at the infirmary?"

"Yup." Liam's glad Brett wasn't working; last night, he wouldn't have been able to lie about what happened out there. "Nothing's wrong with me. Well, apart from the myriad of psychological disorders." He smiles to show he's kidding... sort of.

"Anything interesting happen?"

His heart jumps uncomfortably. "Nope," he lies, probably unconvincingly.

Brett arches an eyebrow. "If you aren't allowed to say-"

"I'm not allowed to say." He stands up and heads to the shower; Brett follows him. 

"Okay," he says, sounding confused - Liam guesses he's right to be, because Liam's never kept secrets from him before, and never openly admitted to having them, either. Still, a lick of irritation rises in his belly. "You were okay? You didn't... you know, dissociate or anything?"

Liam knows Brett's asking because he cares. But almost every day since they got here - since someone decided to slap another acronym onto his list of problems - Brett's been checking in to see if he's having flashbacks, or dissociating - which is frightening enough for Liam without being asked and having to think back to see if he did - and then, even worse, realising he did, but doesn't remember.

He steps into the shower; it's freezing. "Not that I know of," he says, even though it is entirely possible that he did and doesn't remember it. "Nobody said anything." 

"Okay. And - nightmares? Did you...?"

"I was fine," Liam replies shortly. The shower's too cold; he steps out. "Listen, um-"

He's about to tell Brett he's teetering dangerously close to an episode, but Brett puts a hand on his arm. "Liam," he murmurs. "Um, listen, I thought... maybe we could sit down and talk about it sometime? Together?"

"Brett, I really need some space right now," Liam says. Exhaustion makes him about a thousand times more likely to lose his shit, and what makes it worse is how sweet Brett was when he woke up - how sweet he's still being, even if Liam can't recognise that right now.

"Okay," Brett agrees, backing off. "Sure."

Liam nods shortly, trying to get his breathing under control. He's doing fine until Brett says, "Just let me know."

" _You can't fix me!"_ Liam bellows.

Brett takes a step back from him; he wasn't expecting that. Liam wasn't either - it's come on so fucking fast he can't stop it - so he hardly blames the guy for backing away.

"I was broken _before_ the apocalypse!" Liam shouts. "It wasn't watching Garrett die or being alone for a year or getting stabbed or nearly getting raped that fucked me up! It was everything that happened before that! You wanna know what _really_ fucked me up, Brett?" 

"Liam-"

"It was my dad!" Liam shouts, and then promptly upends the chaise part of the couch, sending pillows flying everywhere; Brett flinches. "Throwing me around every night like a doll! It was _never_ having a name for what kind of fucked up I was, and when I did get one it was worse because everyone Googled it! And just when I thought I could at least say I was straight, I realised I was gay and way more different than I'd originally thought!"

"Liam, please-"

He grabs the closest thing - a glass on the counter - and hurls it at the wall. It shatters, and Fudge - who's standing next to Brett - gives a brief, concerned yelp. 

"My mom never left him! He got arrested and dragged away - only once the cops realised he was honest-to-God gonna beat me to fucking death one day! She did _nothing_ to protect me! Then she got with my stepdad and it was like she expected me to just shove it under the rug like she did. I found a book on parenting when I was thirteen that talked about coping with your child being different than you'd hoped. Like she was the one who had it - and she never got it. I have this thing that makes me act exactly like my dad did, and ever since I was diagnosed, I've been fucking _terrified_ of ever hurting someone the way he hurt me, but I can't control it - I'm not controlling it right now!" 

Brett doesn't say anything - he looks kind of afraid, and he's not moving anymore, not trying to placate him. 

"I already knew," Liam says. He's out of breath and his voice is wobbling; the burn of his I.E.D is simmering out and he's empty. "I already knew I couldn't trust people. That they'd hurt me. I knew before this shitfest happened. I didn't have one moment where I lost my fucking mind, Brett, I had lots of them."

His hands are shaking; there's shattered glass on the floor and the living room is a mess, but it's not the worst thing he's done during an outburst. Not by a long shot. 

"So," he says, voice shaking. "You still wanna try and fix me?" 

There's a pause. Then Brett steps forward, slowly, one hand held out. Liam lets him approach, even though he feels like he's bleeding to fucking death after his outburst. 

Everything he is and every reason for his behaviour is laid bare for Brett now. He's stripped down, helpless, shivering and naked beneath Brett's gaze, waiting to see what will happen.

"I don't want to fix you," Brett says softly. "I want to love you. Are you going to let me?" 

Liam knows his mouth is open and that he should close it, but he can't. Instead he nods once, dumbly, registering the presence of the word "love" in that sentence. 

"Can I touch you?" Brett asks hesitantly.

Liam nods again. 

He stands there with Brett's arms around him for almost five minutes before the destruction around him really hits him - the couch is overturned and there's smashed glass against the wall, in the carpet. 

"Oh, fuck," he mumbles, stepping away from Brett and wiping his face. "Fuck, I'm so sorry. I - I'll-"

"It's okay," Brett reassures him softly. "It's alright. I pushed you."

"You should be able to bring shit up without me losing my fucking marbles," Liam says unhappily. "Never thought I'd say this - but I wish they had anti-psychotics here. At least then I wouldn't hit the fucking roof every time someone made me mildly uncomfortable."

"Hey," Brett says. "You remember what I told you a while ago? I can modify my behaviour so I don't trigger you. You can't. So-"

"But I can," Liam says desperately. "I can, I should be-"

"Liam, hey," Brett murmurs. "You do. I know you do. Everyone blows up sometimes." He looks at the couch. "You weren't kidding about being the Hulk," he murmurs.

Liam laughs, despite himself. "I'll put it back."

They put the couch back together. Liam begins in on the glass before Brett can get to it - Brett works with sick people and hurt people and he can't have open wounds. Plus, well, Liam broke it in the first place. 

"Liam." 

Liam turns to him. "Yeah?"

Brett motions him over, so he goes, willingly, and then sits on Brett's lap when Brett tugs him down. "What's wrong?" Liam asks.

"I'm not trying to fix you," Brett says quietly. "I don't think you're broken."

Liam smiles weakly. "That makes one of us. But thank you." 

"Why do you think you're broken?"

Liam groans, dropping his head so his forehead is on Brett's shoulder. "What are you, a therapist?" he mumbles.

"Just a concerned boyfriend." Brett's fingers are kneading the rungs of his spine, and it feels bone-meltingly good; maybe that's why Liam starts talking.

"I dunno," he mumbles. "Dad beat me up a lot. Kids at school didn't like me. I.E.D. Shot my boyfriend to stop him coming back. Hermit for a year. Almost raped, then stabbed. I mean, I've got a fucking PTSD diagnosis, you know? There's gotta be something missing up here." He taps his skull. 

"Doesn't mean you're broken," Brett murmurs. His fingers are still kneading Liam's spine; if he goes much lower he's gonna be right into Liam's erogenous zone, hitting the sensitive dimples in the small of his back. "Do you feel broken?"

Liam hesitates. Then he sits up a little, looking at Brett, taking in the concerned set of his eyes and mouth. 

_Not when I'm with you_ , he thinks, but he clears his throat and says, "Um, not all the time. Just sometimes. When shitty things happen." 

Brett's face softens. "Then you're just like everyone else."

There's a long silence. Liam leans back against Brett when he's coaxed to, still breathing heavily and shaking from his outburst. He's tired now. 

"I hate this," he says, his voice breaking. He turns his face into Brett's neck; the couch shudders when Fudge jumps up onto it and starts nosing at Liam anxiously.

"I need you to know something," Brett says quietly. "Are you listening?"

Liam nods. 

"Your dad chose to be an alcoholic," Brett murmurs. "He chose not to get help. He chose to hurt you and your mom. You didn't choose to be like this, okay? You aren't him. This might not be what you want to hear, Liam, but you have a diagnosed mental illness, you don't have access to medication or therapy, and you're surrounded by really stressful situations every day that exacerbate the problem. So can you trust me when I say that I know you really can't help it, that you aren't anything like your father, and that I know you're doing your best?" 

"Yeah, I can try," Liam croaks. Fudge licks up the tears on his chin. "I never want to hurt anyone."

Brett strokes his back. "You won't hurt anyone as long as you don't want to," he murmurs soothingly. "And I know you won't hurt me, okay? I'm not afraid of you. Or that." 

Liam nods. "I've been wondering why you've been asking me every day if I'm okay," he mumbles. "I thought I was getting better. Guess not."

Brett's hand snakes underneath his shirt, which makes his stroking motions a thousand times more soothing. "You're doing really well," Brett says. "And you're probably always going to have to cope with it. I'm never sure if you're okay or not, or if you'll tell me. That's why I've been asking."

"I'll always tell you," Liam says, finally lifting his head. "I promise."

"Yeah?"

Liam nods.

"Good." Brett gives him a kiss - it must be salty and sticky but he doesn't comment on it. "Why don't you have a proper shower?"

"It was too cold," Liam mumbles, closing his eyes.

"That's because you didn't turn the hot tap on," Brett says, almost apologetically. 

"... Oh. Okay. Yeah, shower sounds good."

~*~

There's thunder booming overhead when Liam wakes.

His heart is racing when he does, and he realises, groggily, that the crashing noises are probably what woke him up; he lies there and counts the breaks between the thunder and silent flashes of lightning.

He doesn't even get to two seconds before the sky cracks again. The storm is right overhead.

He's breathing fast. He realises it's not slowing down around the time he realises he's warmer than usual, his t-shirt clinging to him. He rubs his face and sits up, then rolls out of bed.

Dizzy. Fuck. He pads down the hallway, shivering a little, and closes the door to the bathroom before flicking the light on. He shouldn't be using it, but he needs to be able to see what he's doing.

He resists the urge to splash his face with cool water as he roots around for the thermometer, then sticks it in his mouth. That's when he stops to take in his reflection - he's pale, save for two angry spots of colour high on his cheekbones, covered in a thin film of sweat.

He closes his eyes briefly - the bathroom light is hurting his eyes, even though it is a muted golden colour. Now that he's out of bed, he's freezing.

The bathroom door opens; Fudge trots in, whining concernedly, and licks Liam's hand and wrist. Liam strokes his head absently.

The thermometer beeps. Liam takes it out of his mouth and squints at the numbers - he really should've brought his glasses in here with him.

101.5. He sighs miserably, shakes the thermometer, and washes the end of it before putting it back in the medicine cabinet. Figures he'd get sick right after coming back. Although, he hasn't been injured recently, so at least he knows it's not an infection. 

"Liam?" 

Brett's standing behind him, looking worried. "What's up?" he asks once Liam's noticed his presence.

"I have a fever," Liam replies exhaustedly, turning around and leaning on the bathroom counter a little. "The storm woke me up." 

Brett puts his hands on Liam's face, eyes flickering up and down, like he's assessing Liam's general state of health. "Hmm," he murmurs. "You feel pretty warm. What did the thermometer say?"

"One oh one point five." 

"That's not too bad." Brett steps back from him. "I mean, you'll probably be uncomfortable, but it's a relatively low grade fever. Come back to bed. Get warm." He rubs the back of Liam's neck briefly. "Do you feel sick?" 

"A little," Liam admits. "So what's wrong with me?"

"I don't know. Could be food poisoning... but you'd be puking right now if it was. Probably just a bug." Brett peers at him appraisingly. "Come down to the med ward with me tomorrow and Mrs. McCall can check you out."

Liam nods quietly. He goes back to bed, but he's only there for half an hour before his stomach rolls threateningly and he realises, with a surge of dread, that he's gonna throw up.

He tosses the covers back and hurries to the bathroom; there's no real urgency behind it, but he knows he's going to puke, so he may as well get here before it's a serious problem. 

Brett comes in just as Liam's emptying his stomach into the toilet bowl. He hears Brett moving, and the tap running. Then Brett's wiping his face with a wet cloth.

"Sorry," Liam croaks miserably. He feels better for puking, but he knows it's a temporary relief at best. 

"You're fine." Brett keeps wiping his face. "Guess you're not coming to the hospital. I'll send Mrs. McCall here at some point if you aren't feeling any better." 

"You're gonna get sick too," Liam mumbles miserably.

"I might not." 

"You will." Liam wipes his face shakily. "Go back to bed. I'll just ride it out here... go to sleep when I'm better." 

"Liam..."

"C'mon, don't make me fight you," Liam groans, giving Brett a weak shove. "I don't wanna beat you up right now." 

"You're not fighting anyone," Brett says with a warm smile. "Okay. But call if you need me, alright?" 

"Yes, Mom," Liam sighs.

Brett leaves him to it, but Fudge stays, his head on Liam's leg. Liam strokes his head, watching Fudge look back at him sympathetically.

"Hey, boy," he says softly.

Fudge's ears tilt. Liam smiles weakly.

It must have been close to morning already, because soon enough, the sun's starting to rise and before he knows it, Liam's been sitting here for hours, heaving intermittently. He hears it when the alarm clock goes off, and Brett begins to move around.

The first thing he does is come to the bathroom; Liam tracks his footsteps down the hallway, hears them pause outside. The door opens, eventually, and then Brett's clothes are rustling as he kneels down.

"Hey," Brett says quietly.

Liam lifts his head; it's pounding viciously, and he doesn't even want to open his eyes. "Yeah?" he mumbles. 

Brett strokes his hair back from his face. "You haven't actually been sick in a really long time," he says softly. "You've been running yourself into the ground for months and you've been stressed. You probably picked up a bug. You'll be over it soon, okay?"

Liam nods, enjoying how cold Brett's hands are against his face.

"Just try to rest," Brett murmurs, his eyes flickering over Liam's face. "Keep warm. Make sure you drink lots of water. I'll come check on you every so often, okay?"

"'Kay," Liam mumbles. He sort of wishes Brett could stay with him. But he's got Fudge, so he's not really alone or anything.

"And don't stay in here," Brett says. "Wait until the nausea passes and then go back out into the living room, alright? It's warmer in there." He sighs. "Can't even watch TV or anything," he says. "Sorry."

"I don't care. I'll just sleep." 

"Good plan." With that, Brett leans forward and kisses his forehead. "I'll see you soon, okay? In a couple of hours. Take care of yourself." 

"You too," Liam murmurs, missing Brett's hands the moment they leave his face and neck. "Bye." 

Fudge follows Brett to the door, but he's soon back at Liam's side, nudging Liam with his nose until Liam pets him softly. After that, he settles on the floor with a sigh, his body a warm weight against Liam's. 

He still feels sick, and he still wants to vomit. His body tries a few more times - each has Fudge rising up and whining, distressed - but he hasn't eaten anything since lunchtime yesterday and there's not much he can do but dry heave. 

He must doze off there, against the wall - when he wakes up, it's because the front door is opening, and Fudge is wriggling out from under Liam's arm and bounding down the hallway. Liam shivers; he's drenched in a cold, feverish sweat and his stomach is still rolling unpleasantly.

"Liam?" Brett calls softly.

Liam clears his throat. "In here," he calls back weakly.

Brett appears in the doorway, his expression worried and sympathetic. "Hey," he murmurs. "I thought I told you to move on out of here and keep warm?"

"I kept getting sick," Liam mumbles. "And I fell asleep I think. How long have you been gone?"

"About three hours." Brett's kneeling in front of him, passes him a glass of water. "Rinse," he orders softly. 

Liam takes a mouthful of water, rinses his mouth, and spits into the toilet; Brett coaxes him into finishing half the glass before standing up, taking the glass off him, and leaning down to help Liam to his feet. 

Liam wobbles a little bit, but he manages to stay upright. He lets Brett usher him down the hallway and into the living room; there's a pillow on the couch.

"Forced bed rest?" Liam croaks with a weak smile. "Seriously?"

"Seriously." Brett pushes him down. "No more staying in the bathroom, okay? It's too cold in there." 

Liam curls his legs up near his chest. "You know," he croaks, "you already have enough sick people to take care of without adding me to the list." 

"You're the most important, though." Brett tosses a heavy blanket over him, then goes into the kitchen; Liam watches as he starts mixing up some of the powdered PowerAde they were rationed. He leaves it on the counter to drag the coffee table closer, then puts the glass on it.

"I want you to try and drink all of that, okay?" Brett asks. "And if you can, get up and get yourself some water. But uh, my shift will be over soon, so I'll come back then, okay?"

"Mhm." Liam reaches for the PowerAde and sits up enough to swallow some of it; he's not feeling that sick anymore, just distinctly off-put by the thought of food. 

He polishes off the glass of PowerAde while Brett's gone, drinks some water, and then heads back to the couch, scratching absently at his left wrist. They've started making him use hand guards now that he's going out more, and while they stop him from getting cut up or bitten on his hands and fingers, they're leaving friction rashes on his wrists. 

There's a knock before he can get back to the couch, and when he opens the door, it's Kira, smiling at him.

"Hi," she says.

He backs away a little. "I'm sick," he croaks. "You probably shouldn't-"

"Brett told me," she assures him. "He doesn't think it's contagious."

"Did he send you to babysit me?" Liam asks miserably.

"No. I sent myself." She ushers him over to the couch and puts the blanket back around him. "Figured you could use some company. I know you have Fudge and everything, but-" 

"Oh, hey," Liam croaks. "Sorry, uh, for interrupting. But I found some vitamins and shit while we were scouting the other day - they're in my pack." 

"Shouldn't you give them to inventory?" she asks.

He squints at her. "I didn't get 'em for inventory, I got 'em for you. Not like you stole them."

She smiles. "Thanks, Liam." 

He shrugs, yawns, and settles into the couch. "No problem."

Kira stays most of the day. She talks about almost everything conceivable, but Liam enjoys listening. He's not sure what distinguishes her rambling from Stiles', but he enjoys this much more - maybe because Kira's optimistic. 

"I told Scott."

Liam rolls onto his back and looks at her sleepily. "You told him? How did he react?" He doesn't need to ask what she's talking about.

She shrugs. "He's with Stiles. Malia knows. But... now that we've essentially switched partners, things are pretty strange. I'm not sure Stiles liked that Scott was with me much in the first place, and now-"

"How could anyone not like you?" Liam asks.

"No, I think he likes me fine. As much as Stiles actually likes anyone, anyway. He just didn't like sharing Scott with me. He's not going to like a baby."

"Everyone likes babies," Liam says drowsily. "Even I like babies. And I don't like anything."

"You like Fudge. And Brett."

"Fudge doesn't talk and Brett's really good at-"

"I don't need to know what Brett's good at," Kira squeaks, and Liam grins sleepily at her. 

"Well," he says. "Just so long as everyone knows they should be really, really jealous of me. What? I have hormones. Sue me. One of the only reasons I didn't kill him was because I really wanted to fuck him."

"That worked out well for you," Kira says, smiling.

"Mhm," Liam yawns. 

"You should sleep," Kira says.

"I'm not tired," Liam mumbles.

"I won't go," she says. "I'll stay here."

He opens one eyelid tiredly. "You don't have to babysit."

"I'm not." She lies down with her legs near his chest and tugs his blanket over herself, smiling. "I'm gonna take a nap." 

He throws her a pillow and watches as she tucks it behind her head. She's starting to show now - he and Brett have been here for, well, almost three weeks now, it must be. So she has to be almost five months along.

"Has it kicked yet?" he asks. 

She smiles. "Two days ago."

"That's so cool," he yawns. "That you're gonna have a baby. I mean it's gonna shit and cry and puke, but it'll be cool. To have a kid around." 

"We have kids here," Kira points out, but she looks touched. "Have you seen them?"

"Seen them? Yes. Also avoided them."

"Why?"

"They stare," Liam yawns. "I mean, so do the adults. But at least they're discreet about it, y'know? If they think we're weird or sinning or fucked up they keep it to themselves and don't say shit. Kids don't have filters."

"Yeah," Kira murmurs. "Are you good with babies?"

"I guess. My aunt had a baby. Right before all this started." Liam can't stop yawning. "I liked him okay. She named him Frederickson, though. I thought that was pretty screwed up, but she was a weird person. But she used to let me babysit sometimes."

"Have you changed a nappy?" Kira asks.

Liam cracks an eye open. "Fuck no." 

"How'd you get away with babysitting without changing a diaper?"

"I used to invite this girl in my class over who loved babies," Liam says sleepily. "She changed his nappy and I did everything else. I think she had a crush on me, looking back on it. Hey, don't look at me. I'm not changing the kid's diaper." 

Kira smiles. "I was kind of hoping you'd help look after him. Or her."

"I will. And Brett can change the diaper. He had a little sister." 

Kira's face softens. "I asked about calling it Lori, if it was a girl. He said yes." 

Liam nods, sighs. "I wish I could find her for him," he murmurs unhappily. "Even if it was just... her corpse, or I didn't find her but I figured out... I dunno, what'd happened... I wish I could do that. I hope I get the chance."

"What happened?" she asks quietly. "Why wasn't she with him?"

"He went to school out of state," Liam explains. "His mom and sister lived in DC. He tried to call but the line cut out and never went back up. He never found out what happened to them. Me neither, but I don't think about it much."

"Doesn't it bother you?"

Liam shrugs. "Sure. Sometimes. But I guess I just... I just assumed they were dead. They were right in the middle of it, you know? And my mom, she couldn't even kill a little spider, she was that afraid of them. So I'm not that hopeful. I think I pretty much started mourning the moment I got out of the hospital." 

"I'm sorry, Liam," she says quietly.

"It's okay. Other people have had it worse. Like seeing family members get munched on." Liam shrugs. "Maybe it's better not knowing."

"Yeah. Maybe."

~*~

"... Sleeping all day."

Liam's vaguely, distantly aware of sound filtering into his ears. There's a warm, furry shape curled up next to him. Fudge.

"Has he been drinking?"

"He said he had been. He thought you sent me over to babysit." 

A sigh. "Did you put him straight?"

"Yeah. He seemed to enjoy the company. We talked a little bit, but like I said, he's been sleeping most of the day. His fever's down a little though. I checked it a couple of times." 

"I'm awake," Liam grumbles sleepily. "Wait, who's here?"

He hears them both chuckle a little. "Me, dumbass," Brett's voice says fondly. "And Kira." 

"Oh. Right." 

He opens his eyes blearily; Kira and Brett are standing at the front door. Kira waves at him. "I'm gonna get going," she says. "Feel better, Liam, okay?" 

"I will," he says. "Thanks for coming by."

"No problem." She hugs Brett goodbye and takes her leave.

Brett comes over and kneels by Liam's head. "You okay?" he asks. "You didn't get up."

Liam tilts his head. "Yeah. I'm lazy." He sighs as Brett kisses his forehead gently. "How was... work?" he asks awkwardly. "Brett, are we domestic now?"

Brett outright laughs at that. "Guess we are. It was okay. I'm still learning stuff."

"I'm glad I don't have your job," Liam says, getting up to follow Brett as he heads into the bathroom. "I just have to shoot things and look for useful stuff."

Brett smiles fondly. "Yeah. You're keeping us all fed. Speaking of which, I went by inventory and brought you home some soup." He turns back to Liam. "You seem like you're feeling a little better."

"I am. I don't think I have a fever anymore." Liam starts stripping down as Brett steps into the shower, then joins him. Brett smiles.

"What're you doing?"

"Save water," Liam says innocently. "Shower with your boyfriend."

Brett smiles and touches his face softly. "Yeah. You feel a lot cooler. Reckon you can keep some soup down?"

"I'm pretty hungry," Liam says, reaching for the shampoo.

Brett takes his wrist. "What's this?" he asks curiously.

"What, the rash?" Liam asks. "It's where the gloves bite into me. I've always gotten heat rashes." 

"I've never seen you with them," Brett murmurs as he dumps shampoo on Liam's hair and starts scrubbing.

"It was winter. Guess I didn't have any. Mm." He tilts his head happily. "Left."

"Are you part cat?"

"I dunno, just go left. Lefter." 

"Lefter? Seriously?"

"I barely finished freshman year, Brett." 

"Right, sorry." 

When they get out, Brett starts microwaving some soup. Liam's still feeling a little shaky, like he's got chills, but his fever's gone and he doesn't feel that sick anymore, really. Just distinctly not-hungry. Still, he has to eat.

"You sure you're feeling better?" Brett asks.

"Yeah, why?" 

Brett watches him closely. "Nothing," he murmurs. "You just look pale."

"I was puking all last night, you know," Liam responds pointedly.

"I know. That reminds me." Brett pulls the powdered PowerAde down from the cupboard, dumps a scoop in a glass, and fills it with water. "Here. Drink all of it before we go to bed, alright? Your mom was right about you needing electrolytes when you've been sick."

Liam takes a sip, screwing his face up at the taste; he's never enjoyed sports drinks much. "What are electrolytes, anyway?" he asks.

"They're basically salts that carry electrical pulses around your body," Brett explains, watching Liam carefully - Liam knows he's making sure that Liam finishes his soup and PowerAde. "Your cells need them to be able to perform muscle contractions. When you're low on them it can be bad for your heart." 

Liam smiles.

"What?" Brett asks slowly.

"Nothing. I just like listening to you talk. You're smart." Liam swallows a mouthful of soup. "I know you were in college, but weren't you studying psychology? How do you know this stuff?"

"Inordinate amounts of time spent on Wikipedia for no good reason," Brett admits. "I liked learning. I just didn't like being tested on it." 

Liam smiles. His boyfriend's smart, which honestly makes him really, really fucking proud. He's not that smart, really, but Brett is - and Liam's learning a lot from him.

Brett yawns widely. "C'mon," he says. "I'm beat. Let's go to bed." 

~*~

There's almost a whole fortnight of peace after that. 

Liam goes on three more scouting trips - one day one, which only includes him and Malia, and two overnight ones with her, Stiles, and Scott.

They haven't found any sign of Oakridge. They've found plenty of recently-dead bodies, but no more live people. Liam wonders if they were all trying to get there.

He's still got the picture of the young family in his pocket. He's not quite sure what to do with it, really. He should've known that it would come back to bite him, though - secrets always do, and maybe he should've remembered that before lying to Brett about what these scouting trips were for.

He's just gotten back from front-end duty, which is by far his least favourite part of his designated job. Front-end duty basically means he stands around at the gates for six hours to let people in and out. It's probably the most boring thing he's ever had to do, and the only upside is that he can take Fudge with him.

When he gets home, it's morning - he had the overnight shift - and Brett's sitting on the couch, obviously waiting for him.

"Hi?" Liam asks.

"Hey." Brett stands up - and hands the picture to Liam. "Who're these people?" 

Liam takes it like it's going to burst into flames; he doesn't need to look. "Um," he says pitifully. He's always sucked at lying, he doesn't like lying, and he especially doesn't like lying to Brett. "I, um..."

"C'mon," Brett says. "You can tell me."

"I'm not supposed to, I - Malia told me-"

"Malia told you not to tell me what?" Brett asks.

Liam gnaws his lip anxiously. "We, um. Remember that two-night scouting trip I went on?"

"Yeah."

"We... we found people."

Brett's jaw drops. "You found people? Actual living people?" 

"Yeah." 

"When were you gonna tell me?"

"I wasn't," Liam moans. "I wasn't supposed to, I - I'm sorry, I don't-"

"Why are you really out there?" Brett interrupts. "Sometimes you're gone for days and come back with hardly anything. So what are you actually doing out there, Liam?"

"You can't tell anyone I told you," Liam begs. "Especially not Logan."

"Okay, I promise."

"We're looking for Oakridge," Liam blurts out. 

Brett stares at him. "Oakridge?" he repeats slowly. "You're looking for Oakridge? And you didn't think to tell me that?" 

"They put me on the scouting detail because they knew you wanted to go to Oakridge!" Liam cries. "And because they knew that I'd do anything to find it for you because it was what you wanted! Malia made me promise not to tell you because Logan doesn't know and she knew I'd agree because I didn't want you to have false hope that it might exist when we haven't found any sign that it does!"

Brett stares at him. "You did all this for me?" he asks.

"I wanted to find Oakridge for you." Brett's lowered his voice at least, so Liam can stop feeling like he's being interrogated. "I thought your friends and your mom and sister might've gone there. But there's - Brett, we've been finding people. Last time we went out we found people. We were ordered not to tell anyone - and they were all bitten and we had to put them down - and they were looking for Oakridge too. Nobody knows where it is." He swallows. "I'm sorry."

Brett sits down, right where he is, in the middle of the floor, and buries his head in his hands. "If Oakridge doesn't exist, then where did they go?" he moans, voice breaking.

Liam stands there, locked in place, watching as Brett's back quakes and he sniffs. He's never seen Brett cry like this - only once, when he'd been stabbed and was sick, but he doesn't remember him outright sobbing or breaking down. He's never felt more inadequate... more useless. 

His mind spins its wheels in the mud. What would Brett do? How would Brett comfort him?

_He'd sit down with me and hold me_ , Liam thinks, going closer hesitantly. _Until I stopped, or felt better._

He sits down next to Brett and hugs him tightly, putting his head down on Brett's shoulder and bicep. There's a long silence, but Brett leans into him.

"I'm sorry I yelled at you," he croaks.

"That's okay," Liam replies instantly - and he means it; it is. He doesn't care. "I didn't take it personally."

Brett turns his head and gives Liam a tiny smile. For his part, Liam pulls his sleeves over his hands and starts wiping up the tears on Brett's face. "It's not okay for me to yell at you, Liam."

"I yelled at you. And I flipped the couch over and broke a glass."

"That's different," Brett argues. "You have I.E.D. I don't. I just-"

"You said everyone blows up sometimes," Liam points out. "If it's true for me it's true for you too. It was kind of your turn anyway, you know? You're like... dangerously optimistic." 

Brett chokes out a laugh.

They sit on the floor for a while, until Brett stands up. "I have to go to work," he says.

Liam doesn't want him to go like this, but maybe it'll take his mind off it. "Okay," he says reluctantly.

"What're you gonna do?" 

"I dunno. Play with Fudge?"

"You have to get a hobby," Brett says.

"I have hobbies," Liam says. "They include not dying and not letting anyone around me die."

Brett chuckles a little.

~*~

Fudge basically never gets tired.

Which sucks, because Liam's been out here two hours now, and he's exhausted. But Fudge keeps bringing his ball back and looking up at Liam like he's the entire world, so Liam keeps throwing the ball.

"Is that a dog?!"

Liam turns around; there's a little girl, standing with her father, staring at Fudge with her jaw open. She must only be six years old.

"Yeah," he says. "You wanna pat him? He's friendly."

She turns to her dad, who smiles and says, "Go ahead."

Fudge sits when the little girl approaches, letting his tongue loll out as she strokes his ruff hesitantly, then with a little more confidence. "What's his name?" she asks.

"Fudge."

"That's a really good name!" she says cheerfully, and Liam grins.

"I like you. What's your name?"

"Savannah." She points. "That's Daddy."

Her father approaches. "James," he says, shaking Liam's hand. "You're Liam, right?"

"Yeah. How did you know-"

"You brought in all that deer meat," James says with a small, grateful smile. "Fed everyone for about a week. You and Brett have quite a reputation."

Liam licks his lips nervously. "As-"

"As two very capable people," James clarifies quickly. "Reliable. Not for anything else." 

He nods, relieved. 

"No one minds," James says kindly. "At all. Thank you for feeding us - and tell Brett thanks too, when you see him. A few days ago he treated my wife for an injury. He was good to her."

"I will." He watches as Fudge rolls onto his back and lets Savannah stroke his belly, leg kicking. "Brett's right," he murmurs. "You are kind of pathetic." 

James laughs. "It's good to have a dog around. Lots of the kids haven't seen one in so long they've forgotten what it's like." He leans down to pat Fudge too. "Surprised he made it this far. We saw plenty of dogs attack the walkers."

"I think he used to be a service dog," Liam says. "He's so well trained it's hard to think he was just a pet, you know?"

"I know what you mean." James straightens up. "We'd better get going anyway," he says apologetically. "Savannah has school. But don't be a stranger, okay? Come say hi." 

Liam smiles a little. "Okay. Will do."

"Bye, Liam," Savannah says cheerfully. "Bye, Fudge!"

Fudge barks once, tail wagging. Liam watches as they walk away, with Savannah giggling and swinging from her dad's hand. This community really is peaceful - almost a haven.

It sort of worries him. From what he's seen, while the scouts are highly trained and skilled at what they do, the civilians have almost no training and no idea what lies beyond the walls that keep them isolated - the threat of walkers or otherwise. 

Fudge's ears prick; he stands up, barks once, then bounds behind one of the houses.

"Fudge!" Liam calls - and Fudge doesn't obey him. 

That's so far out of the norm that Liam follows him, cautiously picking his way between the fences and trees. It's darker back here with the shade of the foliage and the wall. These houses aren't populated, because the trees are so close, and a lot of them weren't even finished being built. Liam's sort of hesitant about going back here - nobody's really meant to.

"Fudge?"

Fudge is barking furiously, and even as Liam breaks into a run, he hears a blood-curdling scream rise up over the treetops. He rounds the corner.

The first thing he notices is the gaping hole in the wall, caused by a fallen tree - the storm. The storm had to have done it; that's what woke Liam up that night, not the thunder. There are no less than three zombies at the back of the house; Fudge is braying frantically, and there's a boy shoved up against the wall - Liam can see blood, but he can't tell whose it is-

He doesn't have his crossbow, but he does have his machete - scouts are the only people allowed to carry weapons within the walls - and he yanks it out, promptly dispatching the zombie clinging to the boy, who's howling with pain. 

"Liam?"

He catches sight of James, standing with Savannah, looking petrified. "Get Logan!" he calls desperately, swinging his machete into the second zombie. "Tell him there are biters inside!" 

James takes off; Liam dispatches of the last zombie easily, because they're old. He's whipping his belt off and wiping his machete on his shirt next.

"What's your name?" he asks the boy.

"Zack," the boy sobs.

"I'm Liam. Lie down for me, okay?" He can't believe he's about to do this; he's probably going to puke all over the poor kid. There's a bite mark on his arm, just above the palm of his hand, and maybe Liam's fast enough this time. Maybe.

"What're you gonna do?" Zack keens.

"Nothing," Liam rushes to say, using his belt to tie off Zack's arm. "Hey, you like dogs?"

"Y-Yeah-"

"This is Fudge," Liam says, pulling Fudge closer by his collar and praying that Fudge is as switched-on for other people as he is for Liam. He wipes his machete again, to get all the zombie juices off it. There's no point amputating the bite if the kid is just gonna get infected with the blood on the blade.

He's never done this before. The last time he witnessed an amputation, he passed out. How long has it been? He doesn't know.

Fudge licks Zack's face frantically, whining. He knows it's bad. "Just look at Fudge, okay, Zack?" he asks shakily. He's counted a minute in his head. How long ago was Zack bitten? When he screamed? If it was when he screamed, and the bite is this low down, then maybe-

"What are you-"

Liam puts his knee on Zack's arm and swings the machete down, as hard as he can, not wanting to have to do it twice because he really doesn't think he'll be able to. 

Zack's scream is so loud his ears ring with it, and he almost passes out right there - there's blood everywhere, all over his hands and shirt and jeans and even in Fudge's ruff. But the bite is gone - along with the hand and wrist - and Liam wraps the area clumsily in his hoodie before scooping Zack off the ground bodily and taking off to the hospital.

"You cut my hand off!" Zack shrieks.

Liam knows he did what he had to, but Zack doesn't know that, and that alone makes him feel guilty enough to contemplate launching himself off the infirmary roof. "I had to, Zack, I'm sorry," he pants. "But you're gonna be fine, you're gonna-"

"Liam, what the fuck happened?!"

It's Malia, racing towards him. "There's a hole in the fence," Liam pants - his stamina hasn't recovered from surgery and Zack's not light. "There were zombies, he got bitten, I have to get him to the hospital-"

"Where?"

"Park Lane - my machete's still there, be careful-"

She doesn't hang around, and Liam runs as fast as he can to the hospital with Zack bellowing in pain. Fudge is still barking, anxiously - he can smell the blood. 

He uses his shoulder to push open the doors to the infirmary. "Brett!" he shouts, his voice breaking. "Brett?!"

He doesn't stop in the lobby - he keeps rushing through until one of the doors opens, revealing Brett and Tamara. 

"Liam?" Brett breathes.

"He needs a doctor," Liam pleads. "Right now."

"Get him on a bed," Tamara orders, holding the door open for Liam so he can get through and put Zack on a gurney. "Liam, what happened?"

Liam straightens up and starts jogging alongside the gurney - he's not sure where they're taking Zack, but he doesn't wanna leave the kid alone. "There's a hole in the fence," he pants. "Fudge - I was walking Fudge, he took off, I heard him scream, I - I don't know if I got there in time-"

"You did a good job," Tamara says soothingly. "It's a clean break. Zack, hi. Do you remember me? I'm Tamara." 

"I'm scared," Zack moans pitifully.

Liam swallows. He remembers that feeling all too well - he's pretty sure he spent an entire week crying and telling Brett how scared he was, every night, when he was delirious with fever. 

"I know you are, sweetheart. But you're gonna be fine, okay?" She looks at Liam. "How long ago did you amputate?"

"Only a few minutes." Liam swallows. "I got here as fast as I could-"

"Shh, I know." 

They round the corner. Dr. Deaton's in the hallway, speaking with Mrs. McCall. They both turn.

"What happened?" Dr. Deaton demands. 

"He was bitten," Tamara says. "Liam amputated it but we need to stop the blood loss and test to see if he's infected." 

"How old is he?" Dr. Deaton asks, joining the convoy moving down the hallway. 

"Eleven," Tamara says. "We could try the Milwaukee protocol, we have the equipment-"

Liam stops walking. _I just amputated an eleven-year-old's hand._

"He's young," Dr. Deaton says. "It might not-"

Mrs. McCall shoots him a warning glare. 

"Liam," Brett says anxiously. "Are you-"

"Go with him," Liam says faintly, gesturing to Zack. He's going to find somewhere quiet to puke, have a panic attack, and pass out, not necessarily in that order. "Make sure he's okay."

"Liam, I-"

"I'm fine," Liam says, his voice breaking. "Please just go with him." 

Brett goes. Liam sits down in the hallway with his head in his hands, Fudge panting and whining beside him. Nobody passes him until a nurse rushes out of the hallway Zack was wheeled down. 

An hour passes. Liam shivers, sitting on the ground with drying blood sticking his clothes to his skin and making him nauseous. Fudge has decided to lie down with his head and shoulders tucked beneath Liam's crooked legs. 

The hospital doors open; Liam looks up to see the nurse returning with a man and a woman. They have to be Zack's parents; nobody spares him a look as they go by.

Another half hour. The door at the end of the hallway swings open, and Brett, Tamara, and Zack's parents exit.

Liam looks up. He kind of wants to die. Brett's eyes catch his, and he opens his mouth, looking worried, like he wants to tell Liam something.

He doesn't get a chance. Zack's mom catches sight of him and makes a beeline for him, her face black with rage.

"April-"

"You cut his hand off!" she shrieks, and Liam shrinks back against the wall. Fudge is growling.

"I-"

"What on earth possessed you to think that you were even remotely qualified to amputate his hand?" she demands loudly. "You're a teenager!" 

"April," Tamara says, grabbing the woman's arm. "April, he did the right thing. If he hadn't done it when he did, there wouldn't even be a remote chance he'll survive this. We all would have done it. Me, Dr. Deaton, Melissa - we all would have done exactly the same thing. Don't blame Liam because he was the only one there."

There's a pause. She still looks livid, but she's not yelling anymore, at least. She even stops to look at Liam. 

Her expression changes gradually - nobody's moved. She looks a little... well, Liam can't exactly tell, because he's not really looking at her. He's looking past her hip to the wall behind her, knowing full well he's about to disassociate and trying really hard not to.

"I'm sorry," she says quietly. "I don't know what..." 

Liam doesn't answer. Fudge licks his hand; he feels it and tries to stay in the present, resisting the urge to slip away to where he doesn't have to think or process. 

"Is he-"

"I think you'd all better go," Brett's voice says quietly. "It's okay. I'll get him home." 

Liam only looks up once everyone's cleared out. Brett's standing in front of him, but he leans down when he notices Liam moving, puts his hands on the sides of Liam's neck. The movement grounds him, and he's able to focus a little better.

"You did a great job," he says softly. "Tamara's right. It's a clean break. Dr. Deaton's got it all cleaned up. Now we just have to wait and see if the coma works. She said you talked to her about it - that's what gave her the idea." 

"He's eleven," Liam croaks. "I-"

"And thanks to you, he has a chance to grow older," Brett murmurs. "Are you with me?"

"Yeah."

"Stand up. Let's go home." 

Liam nods. At least there, he can break down in peace.


	22. Chapter Twenty Two - Non Sum Qualis Eram

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry this took so long T.T But here it is! Hope you guys enjoy :D
> 
> Also, I could not for the fucking life of me find ANY info on how antibody and disease testing works. Hit me up if you know, I'm frustrated and curious.

**Chapter Twenty Two - Non Sum Qualis Eram**

Brett is hardly shocked when, on their way home from the infirmary, Liam stops, takes a deep breath, and throws up into a bush.

Brett rests a hand on his back softly, rubbing until Liam's breathing evens out and he straightens up. "You okay?" he murmurs.

"I amputated that kid's hand," Liam moans. "He's fucking eleven years old and I amputated his hand."

"Liam, you might've saved his life-"

"We don't know that!"

"No, we don't," Brett murmurs, pushing Liam's hair off his face. "But you know what we do know? He was definitely gonna die if you hadn't done it. This way, he might make it." 

"What if that wasn't the only bite?" Liam whimpers. "What if-"

"We checked him. He doesn't have any other bites." 

"He's going to be fucking disabled-"

"And maybe alive!" Brett realises then that nothing he says is going to take - Liam's breathing is whiny and harsh, and Brett knows he's descending into a panic attack. He can't blame him - he nearly had one himself when Liam walked in carrying Zack, covered in blood. "Liam, we don't even know if the infection took, okay, baby? We don't know if he's infected or not. He might not be and we can just wake him up and you'll have saved him either way."

Tears start rolling down Liam's cheeks. "What if he is and it doesn't work and he dies?" 

Brett doesn't know what to say to that; Liam lifts his hand and presses his sleeve against his eyes, breath hitching with a barely-contained sob.

"C'mon," Brett murmurs. "Let's go. Get you in the shower, yeah? Get all the muck off you."

"Liam!"

It's Scott, sprinting towards them. "Hey," he pants. "We need you near the walls, buddy."

"What's wrong with the walls?" Liam asks. His eyes are still red, cheeks wet, but if Scott notices anything amiss, he doesn't say so. 

"There's more trees - more holes-"

Liam pales. "Okay." He turns to Brett. "Sorry, I gotta go."

"Be careful," Brett says. He knows he can't convince Liam to stay when people are in danger and the walls are damaged; the most he can do is hope Scott and Malia watch out for him.

He goes home and feeds Fudge, but after that, he's lost. When he tries to approach to help with the zombies, the walls, he's turned back; he heads to the hospital instead. He can at least check on Zack there, make sure he's okay.

It's been long enough now that Tamara has a sample of the kid's blood; there's no signs of the zombie virus in his system, but he's fully immersed in the coma and they want to leave him there so that his hand gets a chance to heal. Brett can't argue with that - he also can't wait to tell Liam that the amputation worked.

His presence, as it turns out, is much needed.

It starts with one person - an older man, with a fever and awful cough, who can't stop vomiting. They take him in and get him comfortable, start to try and bring down the fever, feed an IV into him to treat the dehydration.

After the man, it's a woman and her son. Same symptoms. And after that, they're arriving in groups - Brett realises they've got an epidemic on their hands around the same time one guy comes in with a blood nose gushing down the front of his shirt.

Any hopes he had of getting out to see Liam are quickly dashed; the infirmary is suddenly overflowing with people, and Tamara's forced to send one of the stationed town messengers to get all the other nurses and doctors from their homes. They're overwhelmed. As he handles the constant intake of people, he wonders if Liam's alright - he's up against zombies, after all. 

"Brett!"

He hurries to where Mrs. McCall is, with the first woman who came in - Jen, who's soft and slender and almost deer like in appearance. To Brett's horror, she's convulsing.

"What-"

"Hold her," Mrs. McCall begs. "I need to get an IV into her."

"I didn't think you were meant to restrain epileptic people," Brett says as he holds her arm down.

"She's not epileptic," Mrs. McCall replies.

It's really bad, Brett realises. They've been here for almost seven hours now, and there must be at least seven infected people - mostly scouts, he notices, stunned. Scouts and wall patrol. This isn't good.

"Brett?"

He turns around; Liam's standing there, covered in zombie guts and blood, panting harshly. Brett doesn't want him to see any of this, not after the day he's had, so he says, "Hey, Li, I can't talk right now, I-"

Jen shakes warningly underneath him. "What's going on?" Liam asks as he watches the doctors work with increasing alarm. "We were told to come back here to get physicals-"

"You're gonna have to wait, sweetie," Mrs. McCall says quickly. "We've got a lot of sick people here."

"Sick people?" Liam looks worried. "But-"

"Liam, please," Brett begs. "It could be contagious-"

"Then I've already breathed it in, right?" Liam asks. "Look, they sent me to tell you guys that we're still struggling with the zombies and that we might have injured or bitten people coming in."

"Still?" Brett asks. "How many are there, Liam?"

Liam looks troubled. "I dunno. Like, we're clearing out the houses near the broken wall, and there are zombies in them, but they look fresh. Really fresh." He motions to the chaos. "Do you guys need some help? They told me to buzz off and get some rest, but-"

"We need all the help we can get," Brett admits.

Liam puts his crossbow down. "What do you want me to do?" 

"Hold her legs," Brett says. "We need to get a needle into her."

Liam bears his weight down on Jen's legs, and Brett only gets a moment to appreciate the solid, muscular lines of his muscles before he has to focus on what he's doing.

"Liam, you said bite victims might be coming through," Mrs. McCall says. "How bad is it?"

Liam's got that wide-eyed look he gets when he's directly asked about something he's meant to be keeping a secret. "I don't know yet," he says. "They sent me because I'm the youngest. They didn't want me to get hurt."

"Did Logan send you?" she asks.

"Logan wanted me to stay. Malia sent me."

Thank God for Malia, Brett thinks as he finally succeeds in getting a needle into Jen's arm. Mrs. McCall starts up the drugs straight away; after this, they've got an onslaught of people who are sick to tend to.

"What's happening here?" Liam asks hesitantly. "How did everyone get so bad so fast?"

"We don't know," Brett says. "It seems to have hit all at once." He backs off Jen, motions for Liam to do the same. "How are the walls?"

"There are more holes than we thought," Liam admits. "Three more that we've found so far."

"What? How? We have patrols-"

"They've been slacking off," Liam says. "And the trees are so dense around there that no scout would've noticed them coming in. Someone's gonna get lynched for this. But the zombies, Brett - I don't-" His eyes cut to Mrs. McCall; he doesn't want to say in front of her.

"Take a break," she advises Brett. "You'll be knocking off later than usual."

He nods and follows Liam out into the hallway, grasps his elbow once they're out there. Liam's still covered in blood from Zack, and he looks tired - the kind of bone-tired you get from doing too much at once, working too hard, and not resting.

"Liam," he murmurs. "Be honest. How bad is it?"

"We don't know if we can push it back," Liam whispers, keeping his voice down as people thread past them. "Someone got bitten - they brought him here but - Brett, half the zombies I saw out there, in the houses that is - they don't have bite marks." 

"So - so they're infected with the original strain of the virus?"

"Well no - the original strain died out," Liam says, "but that's not why I'm worried. They're not old, you know? And none of them have any evidence of injury, or anything like that. I can't tell what killed them. And normally I can, you know? I look and I can tell what got 'em. But not this time around - they're different."

"No wounds?" Brett asks blankly. 

"No, none. Not on any that I've seen. And I've looked." 

"They might be carrying disease," Brett murmurs, then realises Liam's watching him with a searching expression - he wants Brett to tell him it's okay, that it's all fine, not to worry. But Brett can't do that - he can't offer an explanation, either.

"Here." He fishes in his pocket. "Are you meant to go back out there?"

"Only to report to Logan. Then we're back here for physicals." Liam watches Brett yank a bandana out of his pocket. "What's that for?"

Brett ties it around Liam's neck - the bright, happy purple looks fucking ridiculous on his very serious boyfriend, but he doesn't care. "If you come across any sick people, or more zombies, cover your mouth and nose," he says. "If you aren't infected with anything, it'll stop you getting it, and if you are, it'll stop you from transmitting it." He kisses Liam's forehead briefly. "You doing okay?"

Liam nods uncertainly.

"Okay. Good. Listen, stick with Malia. Do what she tells you. I'll see you tonight, okay, baby?"

"Okay." Liam plucks at his bandana. "You should use one too."

"I've got one," Brett assures him. "Be safe."

"You too." Liam gives him a quick peck on the cheek goodbye, picks up his crossbow, and heads back out. Brett's head is spinning; he doesn't know how things got this bad, but there are sick people flooding into the infirmary and it sounds like they're going to have more bite victims later.

There's nothing to do except get back to work.

~*~

Brett logs twelve hours at the hospital that day.

Finally, they've managed to stabilise the eight people that reported with symptoms, and they've scrubbed themselves down. Brett's hands and arms burn from the harsh chemicals they use to get clean; even his nose hurts from inhaling them. If he's really unlucky, the chemicals are carcinogenic and cancer will get him before a zombie can. That'd really be the icing on this incredibly fucked-up cake.

He dismisses that thought; it sounds a lot like Liam in his head, and it's accompanied by the mental image of Liam's scowling, pissy expression.

"Brett."

Tamara's standing there, looking apprehensive. "Yeah?" he murmurs.

"I thought you should know," she says softly. "When Liam came back from his scouting trip a few days ago, I was assigned to check him over."

"And?" Brett asks slowly.

"He dissociated twice," she murmurs. "Once when I was walking him down the hall, and again on the exam table. He doesn't know it's happening." 

Brett closes his eyes. "I figured it probably was," he murmurs. "Sometimes he knows it is and he fights it off - he almost did when Zack's mom yelled at him, but he managed to come back. Other times it's like he just checks out instantly."

"Depending on the level of emotional severity, it could be worse," she agrees. "He hadn't slept in more than twenty four hours when he got back here, he was hungry, and medical situations seem to trigger it."

Brett shakes his head; the idea that Liam's checking out of his own mind because he's so stressed out and struggling to cope has knots forming in his stomach. "How do we help him?" he asks. "If he doesn't know it's happening, that is."

"Well, that's the first part - teaching him to identify when it is. But Brett... look, he's young. Grown adults have enough trouble dealing with PTSD when they have access to therapy and drugs. It's going to be an uphill battle. He's only eighteen..."

Eighteen. Eighteen and nine days. And before, eighteen made Liam legal to date - in some countries, he could drink, even. Eighteen was old enough to go to college and pay taxes and have insurance and sign off on bills and not require parental supervision anywhere. Eighteen was the precipice of adulthood. 

Now, it's different. Eighteen seems incredibly young. Brett thought things would be easier once Liam turned eighteen, but he's the same person he was when he was seventeen years and eleven months old. Eighteen's too young to deal with a PTSD diagnosis. And Brett knows it was completely unavoidable; too much has happened to Liam for him to be able to escape without some trauma. The apocalypse, Garrett being bitten, having to put him down, the year alone, almost being raped, being stabbed... of course he was never going to get out of it easily.

But eighteen is too young. Brett swallows.

Tamara strokes his hair back from his face, hesitant, almost scared. "I'm going to help him, Brett," she says quietly. "As best as I can. I know some things about psychology. And he wants to get better. He's not in denial, and he doesn't want to be sick. We aren't going to be fighting him, and you won't be doing it alone." 

Brett smiles shakily; his eyes are burning. "Thank you."

Not long later, he's finally allowed to go home from the infirmary. Tamara's conversation weighs on his mind; he needs to tell Liam he was dissociating, even if it is hard, even if it scares them both, because Liam can't work on something he isn't aware is an issue. 

Honesty's important. Brett knows Liam keeps parts of his job as a scout from him, and he keeps some of the hospital stuff away from Liam. But when it comes to this - to them - they don't lie, and they don't hide. It's taken him months to get Liam to the point where he's comfortable even talking about how he feels, and Brett's not backing down from that now.

When he gets back, Liam's curled up on the couch, clean and with his nose buried in a book, glasses on. Fudge is curled up next to him; he lifts his head and barks once when Brett enters.

"Hi," Liam says.

"Hey." Brett dumps his stuff and goes over. "How're you doing?"

"Okay," Liam mumbles. "Trying to remember what you said."

"Which is what?" Brett asks carefully.

"That... you know, he was definitely gonna die if I hadn't amputated, and this way he might make it," Liam mutters, pushing his glasses up to rub his eyes. "I mean it - it doesn't make things that much easier. But a little." 

Brett nods. "I'm glad you're trying." 

"It's that or have a mental meltdown."

Brett winces. "About that," he murmurs. "Listen, um... Tamara said you dissociated when you were with her a while ago. Twice." 

Liam nods, surprising Brett. "I kind of figured I did," he admits quietly. "I mean I don't... remember doing it, but I had a flashback to Garrett and when I snapped out of it I was on the exam table. I don't remember getting there or getting up onto it, and she was halfway through the exam by the time I was paying attention again." 

"So you... know it's happening?" Brett questions cautiously.

"I mean, sometimes," Liam murmurs. "Not all the time. Like sometimes I think maybe it happens for a few seconds but I'm never sure. Times like that, though, there are just whole minutes or hours I'm not aware of and I know it must've happened. Even if I don't remember it."

"Fuck," Brett says, stunned. "That must be terrifying."

Liam looks away and shrugs, eyes down. Fudge puts his head on Liam's thigh and huffs, then licks his hand. "How are things at the hospital?" he asks, voice crackling a little.

Brett gets it; Liam doesn't want to talk right now, and pushing him has never worked. "Rough," he sighs, lying next to Liam awkwardly. "It's... I dunno. It's bad, Li. There are a lot of sick people. We had three people come in with bites, too. How are the walls?"

"About the same. We don't know how to patch them up."

They lie there in silence for a while; Fudge nuzzles Brett's hand when he pats the dog absently. 

"Our jobs suck," Liam says finally.

"True," Brett murmurs, then rolls to curl Liam into him, tightly, his arms secure. Liam hugs him back without hesitation.

Liam yawns softly against Brett's shoulder. "What's this for?"

Brett shrugs. "Just... I dunno. Haven't held you for a while. You're warm."

Liam's small in his arms, but not as small as he used to be - his shoulders are broadening again with a sudden growth spurt, and his jaw is more defined than it was when they met. He's still growing into all his bones and extra body, kind of like a puppy. He's closer to being a man than a boy now though. There are no more soft spots left on his body, anywhere - not even his sides and stomach.

"You're growing," Brett mumbles.

"Really?" Liam asks hopefully, and Brett realises Liam thinks he means growing vertically. He winces.

"Not that way, buddy. Sorry."

Liam huffs, but he doesn't pull away. "Got my hopes up."

"I know. If it's any consolation, nobody really thinks you're that short."

"Oh yeah? I've heard Stiles call me every possible variation of the word midget since we got here."

"Is he bothering you?"

"Always," Liam grumbles. "But not in the way you mean, no."

Brett smiles a little; he's going to take that to mean that Stiles has probably been teasing Liam, but not beyond what would be normal for a relatively brotherly relationship. "You wanna shower together?" he asks.

Liam brightens immeasurably. "What kinda question is that?" 

With that, they get off the couch - Brett takes Liam's glasses off because Liam seems to have forgotten he's wearing them - and flicks the water on. He's surprised when Liam steps close to him and begins to tug the hem of his shirt.

"What're you doing?"

Liam shrugs, forcedly nonchalant. "Nothing," he says as he helps Brett out of his clothes. 

It's only when Brett's out of them and Liam's putting them in the washing machine that he gets it. Liam's trying to take care of him - and how many times has Brett helped Liam undress when he was too weak or sick to do it himself?

His heart softens; he tugs Liam a little closer to him and says, "Your turn." 

"Was it a rough day?" Liam asks as Brett pulls Liam's shirt off over his head, revealing his torso. He's pleased to see that Liam's regained most of his muscle mass - maybe, one day, if he's really lucky, he might even end up having fat to spare. Not for now, though.

"Sort of," Brett says softly. "A lot of people are pretty sick. Are you feeling okay?" He touches Liam's forehead as he says it, then the sides of his neck. His skin is blessedly cool to the touch.

"I'm alright."

"How about you? Rough day?"

Liam yawns when he mentions it. "Mm, yeah," he says thoughtfully as he steps out of his jeans. "I mean... well. Yeah. Zombies and stuff. And we don't really know how - where they came from or anything. People got bit. Just stupid stuff but - I think it's worse that people are sick. You know?"

Brett used to think Liam's run-on, confusing sentences were a symptom of anxiety or dissociation. They aren't, he's learned - Liam talks himself in circles when he's really tired. Zack doesn't seem to be on his mind, so Brett decides not to bring it up.

"What's going on with the wall?" he asks instead.

Liam steps under the water with a relieved sigh; he's already showered, but he likes water. Brett remembers that much from when Liam was sick with his infection, and water was one of the few things that worked to calm him down.

"Not sure," Liam says once his hair is soaked through. "I mean, there's more than one hole. I found two more - they were smaller. I dunno, um - can I tell you something?"

"You can tell me anything," Brett murmurs as he presses his thumbs into the sharp, graceful arches of Liam's hip bones.

"I think - most of the holes, or gaps, whatever, they were made by trees," Liam says. "Which makes enough sense with the storm the other night, right?"

"Right. Go on."

"But - well, I was out there with Mal, because we were dispatching the zombies so the architects could get in there and patch the walls up, right? And we both agree - at least three of the smaller holes were made by a person."

Brett freezes; his fingers had just been snaking around to Liam's lower back. "By people?" 

Liam nods, looking like he's waiting for Brett to tell him he's crazy. Brett's not so sure he is, though; small holes would allow zombies to enter unnoticed, particularly in the area Liam found Zack, what with it being uninhabited.

"They were made from the inside," Liam confesses quietly. 

"The inside?" Brett asks slowly. "You're saying that a person made those holes from inside - to let zombies in?" 

"Maybe," Liam says uncertainly. 

Right. Liam's job isn't to think about how the holes got there or why or who did it; it's his job to stop the zombies getting in and being a threat to them. He can't afford to think about other stuff when he needs all his wits to stay alive. 

"Have you told anyone else?" Brett asks.

Liam shakes his head silently. 

"Good. Don't." 

"Wasn't gonna." He steps closer and leans against Brett's chest, his skin warm and slick, their bellies shifting against each other with their breathing. Brett's almost completely hairless on his torso, but Liam's got chest hair and a snail trail; it sort of tickles. 

Liam kisses his chest, then his throat, then leans up on his toes to start nibbling at Brett's jaw. Brett sighs, holding Liam's waist, mimicking Liam's own grip on him. Liam's fingertips dig into his sides; there's no painful bite of fingernails, given that Liam barely has any.

He finally acquiesces and leans down, capturing Liam's mouth softly under his own. Liam makes a very slight noise, and Brett smiles a little when Liam's dick twitches eagerly against his thigh.

"Really? You wanna have sex now?" 

"I wanna have sex all the time," Liam says pointedly, "I'm a teenager."

"Well, who am I to refuse you?" Brett replies with a smile. "Turn around."

Liam's face flashes with a brief, victorious smile - as if he really had to work to get Brett to fuck him, for crying out loud - and he turns to face the wall. "Where do you want me?" he asks with a deliberate inflection of innocence.

"Oh... anywhere." Brett puts a hand on Liam's hip and tugs until he's right where Brett wants him. "Yep. Like that. Now hold still."

It doesn't take long for him to prep Liam; initially, it used to, and Liam sometimes shook like a strong wind might blow him over. Brett knows now it was because of nerves, because Liam was used to it at least not feeling very good even if it wasn't painful. 

Brett knows he doesn't think like that now, though; he has Liam keening within three minutes, his arms shaking where they're braced against the shower wall. Brett hopes they're done before the hot water gets switched off.

He enters Liam a little slower than usual, because they've never tried this way before and he doesn't want to hurt him. Liam chastises him briefly for going slow, then turns to look over his shoulder, his eyes catching Brett's and smouldering like a fire that refuses to be completely extinguished.

"Go faster," he pleads. 

Brett picks up the pace; Liam whimpers and curls his fingers uselessly against the tiles. He'd normally be scrabbling for a purchase in bed, but here, he doesn't have one - he's going to have to rely on Brett to keep him upright. 

"That better?" Brett pants.

Liam drops his head a little, mouth open, water dripping off the end of his nose, and gives a loud, echoing groan in the tiled bathroom. Brett's dick twitches urgently. It's not that they don't have sex frequently enough that he's got really low stamina; that's not true at all. It's more that Brett feels like Liam's body was made for him, and that his body was made for Liam, and it's really, really hard not to come with Liam's body writhing underneath him and around him, falling apart under the pressure of his thrusts.

"Brett," Liam groans warningly.

Brett leans forward, enough to get his hand crossed over Liam's hip and start stroking his dick. Liam's hips pitch forward, and Brett watches the muscles in his back and shoulders bunch up - listens to his breathing shorten to irregular gasps. 

He delivers a particularly punishing thrust, and that's it for Liam - he gives one startled, surprised moan, and then he's coming against the wall of the shower, the spasms of his body tipping Brett over the edge as well.

They stand like that for a while. Liam's thighs are shaking; Brett rests his head between the broadness of Liam's shoulders and pants, trying to catch his breath.

There's a long silence. Then Liam says, "You sound like a dying animal." 

Brett chokes on a surprised laugh. "Fuck you."

"Seriously. Old man."

"Okay, so I'm not fucking eighteen anymore. Sue me, Liam." He straightens up and pulls out, not missing Liam's wince. "Fuck, are you okay? Did I hurt you?"

"Not really." Liam straightens up. "Bit tender. That's okay. Now we have to get clean again."

"Oh well." Brett starts rinsing Liam off again.

"That was the first time I've had shower sex," Liam tells him, grinning, and Brett puffs out his chest proudly. There's a first for everything, he guesses.

"You know," he says, "one day, you're gonna go on top. Then I can make fun of you for wheezing."

Liam goes suddenly and strangely quiet. 

"Liam?" Brett asks.

"You... want that?" Liam asks hesitantly.

"Want you to fuck me? Yeah. One day." 

Liam grazes his eyes timidly. "Okay. If you're sure."

"You don't have to, you know," Brett says slowly, unsure what's causing Liam's weird demeanour. "I enjoy fucking you. I mean, obviously. I've just never been on the receiving end before. I'm curious."

"I want to," Liam says. "I just - I've never..." 

He pauses again, and it clicks for Brett, suddenly. "You've never topped, have you?" he asks.

Liam shakes his head silently.

"Even with Garrett?" Brett asks carefully.

"No," Liam mumbles. "No, he uh - no. Didn't want me to. I've always bottomed, ever since I realised I was gay." 

"Doesn't seem fair," Brett says, smoothing a hand up and down Liam's back to show him it's okay - he's not judging him. 

Liam shrugs. "He didn't want me to."

Brett's a little reluctant to say anything about that. Fair enough that Garrett didn't want to bottom. But to literally never let Liam even have the opportunity, to not try it once... well, that seems kind of cold, given that their sex life didn't sound like it was particularly pleasurable for Liam.

"He wasn't evil or anything," Liam says.

"I know." Brett starts squeezing Liam's sides absently. "He doesn't have to be evil to have not been very nice to you sometimes." 

Liam shrugs uncomfortably.

"Do you want to top?" Brett asks carefully. These situations are hard for him to gauge; sometimes, like the other day, Liam will explode with almost no warning, leaving Brett reeling and confused and a little bit scared. Other times, the buildup is slow - he can't tell if he's dealing with a potential episode right now. 

"Um," Liam says, and Brett relaxes - Liam doesn't sound tense, just a little timid. "Yeah. I'd like to. One day. You wouldn't... feel weird?"

"Why should I?" Brett asks gently, pulling Liam a little closer to him. "You're my boyfriend, right? There's nothing weird about it." 

Finally, Liam smiles. "Okay. Well... just let me know. If you're interested. But I don't really know what I'm doing. I don't wanna hurt you."

"You know what feels good for you," Brett says. "I trust you."

"You do?" He sounds actually surprised at that.

"Yeah. Hey, I've never been with a guy before you, and you let me learn," Brett says. "Were you scared I'd hurt you?" 

"Of course not," Liam says.

"Of course not. And I'm not scared you'll hurt me either."

Liam opens his mouth - his eyes have gone all soft and emotional, vulnerable, even, and he looks like he's about to say something important.

At that very moment, the water runs icy cold, and they both yelp with surprised before scrambling to the door of the shower. 

It doesn't take them long to get dry and dressed. Liam feeds Fudge, and then they retire to the bedroom; Liam's asleep almost as soon as he lies down, which is fairly standard, his back facing Brett. Brett traces the slight dip in his spine idly, counting the knobs all the way to the base of his skull, then right back down.

Now that he's lying down and Liam's breathing quietly and steadily next to him, there's nothing for Brett to think about except the events of the day. The sick people. The wall. The holes...

He turns his head to look at Liam and watch the slow, steady rise and fall of his back. The scar on his side, left from the stab wound, Brett's botched stitches and surgery, is plainly noticeable, even in the half-light. The nice things about this place, he reflects, is that it's so quiet, they can sleep whenever they feel tired enough. 

Is it safe here for Liam? Brett wonders uneasily. He's not sure he's quite okay with the idea that Liam, who's only just turned eighteen, is carrying a lot of the scouting efforts with Malia and Scott. He knows Liam would go crazy if he was cooped up inside River's End all the time, but at the same time, he can't help but wonder what might happen if Liam dissociates while he's on a run, or has an episode.

Feeling frustrated and more than a little worried, Brett reaches out and tugs on Liam's shoulder until he rolls onto his back, then puts his head on Liam's chest. Liam sighs. Brett tells himself it doesn't matter right now - Liam's alive and pretty much okay underneath him, his heartbeat like a metronome - and that he'll cross that potential bridge when he gets to it. 

For now, he tries to catch some sleep while he still can.

~*~

When he wakes up, Fudge is jumping up onto the bed.

Brett groans as Fudge sniffs him enthusiastically, then settles down in Liam's empty spot, right next to Brett, and stares at him.

Brett throws an arm over the dog. "Morning, buddy," he yawns. 

Fudge gives him an affectionate lick on the cheek, making Brett groan. "Where's Liam?"

He listens for a moment. He can hear the shower; Liam's awake. Brett must've been tired to not notice him getting up. 

A few minutes later - Brett's dozing with his arm still thrown over Fudge's body - the door cracks back open, and Brett hears Liam moving around quietly. "Morning," he mumbles sleepily.

"Hi. Sorry, didn't wanna wake you up."

"You didn't." Brett rolls onto his back to watch Liam get dressed. "Fudge did. Hey, what's all that?"

He's referring to Liam's arms, which seem to be covered in tiny cuts and scrapes. He didn't notice them yesterday.

"Oh," Liam says. "I got kinda cut up with moving all the trees and shit yesterday."

"Take one of my shirts today," Brett says, sitting up a little. "One of the long-sleeved ones. No point getting all scratched up if you can avoid it."

Liam finds one of his shirts and pulls it on. "It's too big."

"Doesn't matter." Brett smiles fondly; it's not as big as they used to be on Liam, which is saying something. He thinks Liam's broadened out a little bit, particularly around his chest and shoulders. Then again, he must nearly be done growing. 

"You're snuggling Fudge," Liam says with a smile, and Fudge lifts his head.

"He forced me to," Brett grumbles.

"Nah." Liam wraps his arms around Fudge's neck and presses a series of kisses to his snout and face, which Brett thinks is disgustingly cute. "He loves hugs," Liam coos. "Look at his face. He loves them."

Brett's not giving Liam the satisfaction of watching his dog literally salivate over attention. "Where're you going, anyway?" he asks.

"I have to get back to the walls today," Liam explains. "They need everyone they can get. A few of the scouts are down sick."

That's when Brett recalls everything from the day before - the illness, the holes in the walls, the zombies getting in. Liam telling him some of the holes were man-made, or at least seemed to be.

"Be careful," he tells Liam. 

Liam nods. "You too. Don't get sick or anything. I'm a really bad nurse."

Brett smiles; he's not. He remembers Liam taking care of him when he had pneumonia, wiping his face and neck down and rubbing his back and generally providing whatever comfort he could. "No you aren't."

Liam gives him a brief kiss goodbye; when Brett finally exits into the kitchen, with Fudge on his heels and whining for his breakfast, he sees Liam's made him coffee. It's still steaming.

"Best boyfriend ever," he yawns, getting Fudge's food out and then settling at the counter. 

He rubs his face. Reads for a little bit. Takes a shower. Remembers Liam telling him about the holes, how he thinks they were deliberately made... wonders why the fuck anyone would want to let the zombies in here when most of the occupants of River's End have no training.

He needs to ask Liam how he knows they were man made. And if they really are, how to figure out who did it. Liam must have something useful to go on - tracks, marks on the walls, anything. Liam has to have noticed something - he notices everything. 

Fudge puts a paw on Brett's knee and barks once. Brett tosses him a strip of deer meat. 

After breakfast, he heads down to the hospital - he locks Fudge inside, knowing that Liam will be pissed if he comes back at any point and finds the dog wandering around in the yard when zombies are inside the walls. 

He shakes his head. Fudge. He still thinks it's a stupid name, but Fudge really isn't noble enough for a name like Excalibur. 

The moment he steps inside the hospital, everything is chaos. One of the bite victims from yesterday is beginning to turn, skin going grey and sallow, and more and more people are showing up with the illness. Brett's run off his feet from the get-go, drawing blood and administering medication and trying to keep the poor bite victim comfortable.

He gets the guy's details, because someone will have to tell his family. Brett hopes that doesn't fall to him. 

It's sometime past lunch when Liam shows up. Brett's been home to feed Fudge and take him outside already, and he's just looking forward to the prospect of getting a damn break when Liam enters, smiling at him a little. His cheeks are red.

"Hey," Brett says. "What's up?"

"Had some time. Thought I'd come visit." Liam's only got a few specks of dried blood on him; Brett supposes that's good. He looks a little strange, though - flushed and a little sweaty, shifting restlessly where he's standing.

"You okay?" Brett asks. "You aren't feeling sick or anything?" 

Liam stares at him for a moment, then takes Brett's hand and puts it right over his dick. Brett's suddenly aware of the hard line of it beneath Liam's jeans; he swallows, leaving his hand there even after Liam lets him go.

"You came here for a booty call? Seriously?"

Liam whines. "C'mon. I went home and showered and I thought about the shower we had together yesterday. I got all worked up."

"Yeah, I can see that," Brett says pointedly. He looks around; there's no one really here. "Okay. I'm gonna tell Tamara I'm going on lunch."

Liam's eyes brighten. "Does this mean I get my booty call?"

"Yes," Brett chuckles. "Jesus." 

He can't find Tamara, but he does tell Mrs. McCall he's going on break, then returns to get Liam. Finding an empty exam room is a godsend; it even has an exam table, although it is narrow. They'll have to be careful.

"You know, I've never had sex at work," Brett comments.

Liam grins wolfishly; he's already pretty much out of his clothes and making hasty work of Brett's. "First time for everything."

"Right." He backs Liam into the exam table, then hoists him up onto it - a swift, bodily movement that has Liam making a vague, surprised noise - and then crawls up between Liam's spread legs and grinds their pelvises together. Liam grips his sides tight, forehead on Brett's shoulder, and groans. 

"I'm glad I decided to do this." 

"So am I," Brett murmurs. "You bring lube?" He's reaching down as he says it - figures he can at least play while Liam finds it in his jeans - and is surprised when his fingers touch wetness at Liam's entrance.

It clicks, suddenly, why Liam was already so worked up when he got here. "Liam," he murmurs. "Did you already-"

"Yeah, yeah, I already prepped, c'mon," Liam whines, pulling him close. "I knew we wouldn't have a lot of time, so-"

"You. Are. The greatest," Brett groans as he rolls on top of Liam's body. Most of the time, prepping Liam and watching him wriggle and squirm is half the fun of it - but sometimes, Brett wishes it was as simple as flipping Liam over and taking him right there. 

Still, he's gentle as he slides inside, slow, because he doesn't want to hurt Liam and he doesn't know how well Liam's prepared himself. Liam lets his head drop back against the pillow on the exam table, his eyes half lidded, a moan escaping his lips.

"Good?" Brett grabs the undersides of Liam's knees, drags him a little closer to prop him up. He marvels at the muscular set of Liam's thighs when he digs his thumbs and fingertips into the sides of them, squeezing until Liam locks his legs in place.

"Mhm." Liam must've prepped himself fairly well if it's not hurting him. "How much time have we got?" he groans.

"As much as we want, really." Brett tucks his face against Liam's neck. "Why?"

"You mean I didn't have to-"

"No, but I'm really glad you did." He gasps as Liam nibbles at his throat affectionately, returns the favour with a swift thrust of his hips that has Liam melting against the table with a soft, needy whimper.

He's getting used to Liam's body - not being on the road constantly has been great for their sex life, and Brett's starting to learn Liam intimately. Every pressure point, erogenous zone, every part of Liam that collapses into desperate shivers - Brett's mapped them all and left his mark there, more than once. His hips, inner thighs, the dimples at the very base of his spine... Brett's a fan of all of it.

He opts for lying against Liam's body, their stomachs and chests touching, one of Liam's arms wound around his neck and fingers fisted into his hair. He's kissing Brett   
desperately, like he thinks this might be the last time they're together.

Brett breaks the kiss just so he can tuck his face against Liam's neck and lick at his throat and jaw; Liam makes a brief, quiet noise beneath him as Brett zeroes in on the fleshy part of his neck that just about connects to his ear. This is one of Liam's seemingly innumerable erogenous zones, and Brett focusses on it.

Liam's legs clench around Brett's sides. "I'm close."

"Okay. Want me to move?"

"No." 

The whole conversation is whispered - illicit, thrilling because it's just them and the empty exam room and a bare half an hour for Brett's lunch break, because Liam will inevitably walk out of this room looking thoroughly fucked and he'll be proud of it, too, knowing him.

Liam clenches without warning. "Brett," he moans.

Brett runs his hands up Liam's sides. "Yeah," he whispers back shakily. "I know, me too."

They come pretty much at the same time, Brett a few seconds before Liam, Liam between them, totally untouched by either of their hands. Given that they're already smeared and messy, Brett doesn't bother pulling away quickly; he lies against Liam's body and drinks in his warmth and breathing and thinks Liam might be home.

He listens to Liam's breathing slow again; his arms are wound around Brett's shoulders, holding him close, even though his legs have let up on the punishing grip they had on Brett's sides. 

There's a crash in the hallway. That's when Brett remembers he has a job; he starts to straighten up.

Liam looks back at him, lips bitten red, face and neck and chest flushed, hair mussed and crazy. He looks beautiful. Brett wants to tell him he loves him, but he doesn't. Not right now. 

"I gotta go," he says instead, apologetic, trying to get over how weirdly emotional he feels. "Sorry. Gotta love you and leave you." 

Liam shrugs, yawns. "I'll take what I can get." 

Brett smiles a little, slips out, and makes sure to bring Liam a few paper towels to clean up with. "You okay if I go back?" he asks hesitantly.  
"Sure," Liam yawns. "I'll get moving eventually."

"Well, don't be in here naked when the next person comes in to use the room," Brett says fondly, leaning down to kiss Liam's hair. 

"Why not?" Liam asks innocently.

Tamara catches Brett in the hallway about a minute later. "Hey," she says, hurrying to him. "I need to talk to you about the symptoms and progression of the virus when you've got time."

"Sure," Brett agrees, watching as when the exam room door opens, and Liam slips out - looking rumpled and thoroughly debauched, his hair sticking up in different directions, t-shirt askew, belt undone. His face is still red, and there's a series of blooming hickeys across his left collarbone, plainly in sight. Brett can't help but feel satisfied; he smirks a little as he thinks, _I put those there._

Liam turns to look at them, then begins to slink towards the exit. Unfortunately for him, he can't move very quietly with an open belt and about a dozen different knives hanging off him, and Tamara notices him - takes in his appearance, then looks at Brett, fondly exasperated.

Busted, Brett thinks sheepishly.

Tamara waits until Liam's about to pass them before saying, "Have fun, Liam?"

Liam stops and blushes to the roots of his hair. "Um. Yeah."

"Can you stay for a moment?"

"Are you gonna give me a lecture on safe sex?" Liam whines. 

Tamara raises an eyebrow. "Do I need to?"

"No," Liam exclaims. "Please don't. Stiles already did. And Kira, and Mrs. McCall-"

Tamara laughs. "I'm not going to lecture you, chicken. I just want to talk to you about symptoms - you're out on the front line right now, and it's mostly scouts and wall patrol who are getting infected. Look, the number one thing to look for is fever, followed by a rash on your neck and underarms. Coughing after that, vomiting, a bloody nose. Stay away from anyone who's got those symptoms and send them here, okay?"

Liam nods, running a hand through his hair; it only makes it more chaotic, not less. "Okay."

"And thanks for being conscientious enough to come in on Brett's lunch break, instead of while we needed him with patients," she says amusedly. "Buckle your belt before you leave."

Liam mumbles, "I dunno what conscientious means," as he buckles his belt and almost runs out of the infirmary. 

"Poor thing," Tamara says amusedly.

"Don't feel sorry for him, he brings it on himself," Brett says. 

"Something tells me you have at least fifty percent of the responsibility in that," she says dryly.

~*~

Their first fatality occurs two days later. 

Everything's been as calm as it can be - the infirmary is crowded but not overflowing, and most of the sick people are stable, at least.

It's Jen who dies first. They're administering antibiotics when she goes into a series of convulsions that just won't end, screaming the entire time that her body is on fire, that she's dying - and, tragically, she turns out to be right. They stop the first seizure, and the second, but the third one leaves her unresponsive to their attempts at resuscitation and she's pronounced brain dead by a shaking, crying Tamara.

Two hours later, it's the man who had the blood nose. Half an hour after him, a kid, no older than five. All present with seizures, although the man and kid both end up dying from massive blood loss due to internal haemorrhaging. 

They weren't expecting fatalities from this thing because everyone's been stable. Brett stumbles out to tell two of the messengers to start graves. Three of them. He doesn't miss their faces going white and scared, the way they back away from him like he's carrying it himself.

He could be, for all he knows. 

He takes stock of the storeroom. They've got almost nothing left; he heads off to find someone, anyone, to tell them they need to send a scout out - someone who can find them drugs. Not Liam, he prays. Please don't let it be Liam.

He's barely seen Liam the last two days. He's been checking houses for zombies, trying to patch up holes. Every day, he comes home and Brett checks him for fever or rashes. Every day, Liam's miraculously healthy, even as the other scouts drop. It has to be the zombies - the zombies are carrying disease. But they can't just leave them there, or they're going to lose whole parts of River's End and, eventually, the entire thing.

Catch 22. If they send people to dispatch the zombies, people die. If they call the scouts back to the infirmary, away from the disease-ridden zombies, the zombies advance, and people die. 

But it's not Liam. Not yet. He's healthy. And as long as he's healthy, Logan will keep sending him out, and Liam will go because he wants to help. There's no point asking Liam to pretend to be sick; Brett's lucky Logan's even been giving him time off, and that's only because he thinks Liam is still seventeen and considers it child labour to force him to go out.

"Mrs. McCall!" he cries, spotting her down the hallway. "Hey, we need to send someone out - the store room's almost empty."

Mrs. McCall looks at him, her expression broken. "Brett," she murmurs. "We..."

"What?" he demands.

"We don't have any healthy scouts," she says softly.

Brett swallows. "Huh?"

"We don't have any healthy scouts," she says, her voice breaking the tiniest fraction. "Almost all of them are here. The rest are holding back the walkers - we've only got five, maybe six healthy ones, and they're all in different platoons, working with whatever is left of the wall patrol."

Liam's working with people who aren't trained in taking down zombies, and Brett feels weak; Liam didn't tell him things had gotten so bad. His ears are ringing; Liam's been out there dealing with the wall and the zombies for the better part of three days. "I have to find Liam," he breathes. "Can I-"

"Go," she says, giving him a push. "Bring him back here. I don't want to, but - we might be able to send him."

So he does - he's out of the hospital and racing through the streets of River's End, trying to find Liam - who seems to be hiding from him, judging by how hard it is to find him.

He finally finds Liam, helping with the wall repairs. He's got the bandana over his face and nose, and Brett notices a few members of the group coughing. None of them are scouts. They all seem to be civilians.

"Liam," he calls desperately.

Liam turns to him, speaks to a woman next to him, then jogs over, pulling the bandana off his face. "What's up?" he pants. His arms and hands are covered in tiny scrapes and cuts from moving building material and trees.

"Come with me," Brett says, tugging him along. "Put that back over your face." 

Liam pulls the bandana up and follows him back to their house. Fudge looks up when they enter, then leaps down off the couch to follow them into the bathroom. 

Liam pulls his bandana down again. "What's going on?" he asks softly.

"Nothing, just - let me check you?"

Liam shrugs agreeably and takes the thermometer in his mouth when Brett produces it. He touches Liam's face and neck - not any hotter than normal - and flashes a light in his eyes before checking behind his ears and on the back of his neck for rashes. Liam lets him, even though he looks a little stunned and confused.

The thermometer beeps; Liam's temperature is normal. The bandana must have worked, because Liam isn't sick. Not that Brett can tell, anyway, and it's been two full days.

"You're staying right here," he says shakily, running a hand through Liam's hair. "Okay? You are not going back outside."

"Why?" Liam asks. "What's wrong?"

"We've had our first fatalities," Brett admits. "All of them were scouts or wall patrol people who came into contact with zombies recently. You're the one of the only healthy runners we have left, Liam."

Liam blinks. "Why aren't I infected?"

That's a really good question, actually. Why isn't Liam infected? He's been around them enough, and Brett's bandana can't have done that much to prevent transmission. 

"Look," Brett murmurs. "I need you to come down to the hospital, okay?"

"Okay," Liam agrees. "But how're you gonna get me down there?"

"Easy." Brett motions to the sink. "Splash your face with water. Maybe get your hair wet. If we make you look sick, nobody will want to go anywhere near you, no matter how much they might need you."

So they make Liam look as sick as they can - a wet fringe and beads of water on his face help, and he's already a little red from physical exertion. Brett puts the bandana back around his face and wraps a blanket around him.

"Let's go."

Nobody stops them on the way to the hospital; Liam feigns a fairly convincing, sickly, stumbling gait, which Brett is sure helps. Once they're inside, he takes Liam straight to Tamara's office. She's going to want to see this.

She stands up when they enter. "Liam-"

"He's not sick," Brett says as Liam ditches the blanket and pulls his bandana off, then shakes his hair out of his eyes. "I got him to pretend."

"Not sick? At all?"

"No symptoms," Brett confirms. "No fever or rash, pupils are dilating - he's healthy." 

"Okay." Tamara motions to the desk. "Sit down, Liam. We're gonna do some tests. Is that okay?"

"Sure." He looks a little worried. "How many people are sick?"

Of course Liam wouldn't know; he's been fighting back against the zombies and trying to patch the wall. He's not paying attention to anything other than that - it's not his job.  
Tamara begins gathering equipment up to run the barrage of tests that will determine whether or not Liam's actually sick. "Listen, if you're not sick, we can't let you leave, chicken," she murmurs.

"There are people out there who need me," Liam says indignantly.

Mrs. McCall sticks her head in. "Tamara, we need you down the hall," she pants.

 

"Do all the regular tests," she says to Brett quickly. "I'll be back to analyse the samples when I can."

Brett makes sure the door is closed and locked before turning back to Liam. "Look, if you aren't showing symptoms, you might not be infected," he says patiently. "If you're not infected, we need to know why and how, because quite frankly, you should be by now. We can't risk you getting sick." 

That at least seems to clear things up for Liam; he nods and opens his mouth for the swab test, lets Brett check the back of his throat for ulcers, and takes his shirt off when he's directed to. Brett checks his underarms and sides for rashes, but there are none. 

"Leave you shirt off," he says as Liam goes to put it back on. "I need to use the stethoscope."

"You're like a real doctor," Liam says, smiling a little, as Brett warms the pad of the stethoscope between his palms before putting it on Liam's chest. Liam inhales, holds, and exhales without Brett having to tell him, only pausing to ask, "What's this for anyway?"

"The sick people all had a rattling noise in their lungs caused by fluid buildup, and a heart murmur," Brett murmurs, listening intently. Liam's heartbeat is so steady you could probably use it as a metronome, and his lungs sound clear. 

"Sounds okay," Brett says, abandoning the stethoscope. "You might wanna lie down for this one."

"Blood test?" Liam asks reluctantly.

"Sorry, buddy."

"That's okay. But there's nowhere to lie down anyway." He holds his arm out and lets Brett tie off a tourniquet. "I like it better when you draw blood," he mumbles.

Brett almost smiles. "Yeah?"

"You're gentle."

"Only with you," Brett murmurs. "Pinch."

Liam doesn't look as Brett takes his blood, then seals the area with a pressure bandage. "You know, you'd think being stabbed, you wouldn't worry about needles," Brett comments.

Liam shrugs. "I didn't really expect to be stabbed. I expect needles. I know they're coming. And for the record, I'm still pretty worried about being stabbed. You know, the first experience didn't desensitise me to it."

"Desensitise," Brett comments. "You've been reading."

Liam looks so proud of himself Brett's heart melts with affection. Liam's making an effort to learn new things, even though it must be difficult and his learning is almost entirely self-guided - and Brett's proud of him for that too. Liam's come a long way from being just a kid whose only aim was to survive. Now, he wants to live, too.

He grasps the back of Liam's neck, strokes it affectionately, and then kisses him gently. "I'm proud of you," he says, because he wants to watch Liam glow under the praise - and he does, his eyes lighting up and looking like Brett's just told him Christmas is tomorrow.

"So?" Liam asks. "Now what?"

"Now you just... sit pretty and wait for the results."

"I'm not good at waiting. Can I help out somehow?"

Brett shakes his head. "Sorry," he murmurs. "Everyone who needs help is infected, and we can't risk it. I won't risk it."

"I'm fine," Liam says.

"For now," Brett murmurs. "I'm not gonna push our luck, though." He smooths his hands down Liam's neck; Liam blinks back at him, eyes startlingly blue in the bright halogen lights of the office. Brett smiles a little.

"First thing I ever noticed about you was your eyes," he says.

Liam blushes, predictably, but he holds Brett's gaze. "Yours are nicer."

"Not true." Brett straightens up. "Anyway-"

There's a knock; when he answers the door, it's Tamara, looking shell-shocked, covered in blood. "Don't let Liam out of here," she croaks. "It's getting bad and we need him safe. I'll come collect the samples when I'm done."

"What's going on?" Brett asks slowly.

"Nothing you need to worry about right now, Brett," she says. "Just keep him safe, okay?"

"Alright."

When he turns back to Liam, after having locked the door, he finds Liam staring at him - but not really looking. His eyes aren't moving, and he's frozen in place, his fingers white where they're gripping the edge of the desk.

"Liam?" Brett asks softly.

No answer. This isn't a panic attack; Liam's dissociated in the two minutes it took Brett to have his conversation with Tamara.

He steps closer. "Liam?" he whispers, putting his hands on Liam's thighs. "C'mon, baby, you're safe. Come back now. It's okay." 

He hasn't seen it like this before. Tamara said it would happen, especially with what happened with Zack, but he hasn't seen it before and he doesn't know how to snap Liam out of it. He wonders what's going on in his head. Nothing, probably.

He's not sure if this is worse than the panic attacks or not. What he does know is that Liam needs a fucking break and a whole ton of psychological help. Not that he's going to get a chance to get it, probably. 

"Come on, baby," he whispers again. "It's alright. Come back." 

He tries to think back to some of the things she said might help. Something tactile to hold, like a pet - where's Fudge when you fucking need him?

He doesn't have Liam's dog, but he does have the blanket he brought Liam in. He grabs it, wraps it around Liam's shoulders, and watches as Liam curls his fingers to hold the edges weakly. He's trying, Brett knows that much.

"Good job," he murmurs, stepping close and gathering Liam into his arms. "You're alright, baby."

It's a few minutes - Brett can only listen to the chaos outside and pray nobody bursts in, or tries to, what with the door being locked - but eventually, Liam moves against him, sluggishly, his arms wrapping around Brett's shoulders and neck. He lets out a shuddery sigh.

"You back?" Brett asks quietly.

"I think so." Liam's voice cracks.

Brett leans back a little, only enough to see Liam's face. "You okay?" he murmurs. "Want some water?"

Liam nods, and Brett retrieves some, listening to Liam swallow.

"It was the blood," he explains shakily, taking the cup from Brett when it's offered to him. "On her shirt. It was the blood that triggered it, I think." He blinks. "How long did I space out for?"

"A few minutes," Brett murmurs. "It's okay. You're back now, right?"

Liam nods.

"Can I ask you something?" Brett asks quietly, watching as Liam drinks the water with shaking hands. "You don't have to tell me."

"I tell you everything."

Brett's throat closes over for a moment; out of all the ways he thought Liam might change over the last six months, his open honesty with Brett wasn't something Brett expected. He's grateful for it, but it's a lot of pressure, to know that Liam entrusts him completely with his health and wellbeing and - well, Brett's only human. Sooner or later, he's going to slip. 

"Brett?" Liam asks.

"Sorry. What - what do you think about when you dissociate?" Brett questions, keeping his voice low and soothing. "Anything in particular?" 

There's a long pause. Liam drinks some more water; he looks conflicted, but not like he's not going to answer. Brett gives him time, reorganising the medical supplies Tamara left him with and refilling Liam's cup when he sets it down.

"Before," Liam answers finally.

Brett nods. "Not living day-to-day was nice, huh?"

"I don't mean that," Liam replies softly. "I mean... after the zombies came, but before you. That's what I think about."

Brett pauses before he answers. Liam's never broached that period of time before, and Brett knows it must be a sensitive spot, one that's probably still open and bleeding and painful. The most he knows is that sometime between the apocalypse hitting when Liam was fifteen and Brett meeting him, when he was seventeen, Garrett was bitten, infected, and prevented from animating by Liam, and that Liam went to Ashburton.

"Do you... want to elaborate?" Brett asks carefully.

Liam takes another sip of water. His eyes are cloudy. "We were in the sewers when Garrett was bitten," he says. "It sucked but everyone figured that, you know, places with less people before probably had less zombies after. So they thought the sewers would be safe."

They. Brett doesn't miss the way Liam uses the word; he wasn't included in this decision, and it's fairly obvious.

"They sent us to patrol the sewers," Liam continues, "because things had gotten so bad we were some of the only healthy people left. I think some of them were hoping I'd get eaten."

"Why would you say that?" Brett asks, feeling his stomach clench just at the thought of it. 

Liam shrugs. "You kidding? I was small, weak, terrified of everything, and spent most of my time just trying to stay out of everyone's way. I was a mouth to feed and I didn't contribute." He shakes his head. "Anyway. There were these two guys there. Owen and Vinnie. They were cool. They knew I was scared, and that I couldn't do a lot of stuff, so they just tried to give me jobs I could do. Like cleaning the weapons and building fires and prepping any of the animals Owen hunted down." 

"So that's where you learned it," Brett realises. 

"Yeah. Anyway, it... Garrett got bitten, because like, yeah, there were less zombies in the sewers, but at the same time, you couldn't easily get away if you ran into them. Right here." Liam traces Brett's inner forearm. "Only took two minutes for the bite to take. Maybe less. Owen amputated. Vinnie went on a run for medicine. Never came back." 

Brett nods along, watching Liam's fingertips play against his skin. His nails are bitten down; it's been a rough few days for everyone, but especially the scouts, and Liam's a habitual nail-biter at the best of times. Now, they're torn down to the quick.

"It feels like it was all for nothing," Liam admits. "Vinnie going out, I mean. He never came back and Garrett died anyway. And then Owen went to look for him. He left me with his crossbow because it didn't make a lot of noise - he thought I'd handle it better. He never came back either. Waited for a day, but I-"

Liam's voice breaks abruptly in the middle of his sentence; judging by the way he looks away from Brett, his jaw clenched and his eyes glistening, he's just as surprised at the sudden change in pitch. Brett lets him swallow.

"I didn't want him to die down there," Liam says eventually, his voice tight. "Garrett, I mean. In the sewers. I didn't want him to die down there. Nobody - that place was fucking awful. By the time Owen and Vinnie didn't come back I knew Garrett wasn't gonna make it, and the rest of our group had scattered, so I got him out of the sewers and into an apartment." 

Brett doesn't want to think about a fifteen-year-old Liam carrying his dying boyfriend out of the sewers just so he could pass away somewhere else. He wishes he'd been there. The start to his After was relatively peaceful; this sounds like it was hell on earth.

"What happened then?" he prompts.

"I gave him Tylenol." Liam swallows. "Didn't have anything else. We talked a little bit. He woke up enough to ask me if I was okay, say he was sorry, and tell me to go to Ashburton. He'd heard it was safer. That there were some zombies, but not that many. After that, I sort of just - begged him not to die."

Brett's throat swells uncomfortably. Liam would have been alone with Garrett. If anyone else had been there, Liam would never have had to shoot him.

"It took him another half a day to die," Liam says. "I told him to go to sleep and that he might feel better when he woke up. He didn't. I don't even know when it happened, he just kind of... stopped breathing, and it was really quiet and still." 

"And that's where you go?" Brett asks weakly. "When you dissociate? You remember that?"

Liam nods. "Sometimes. It's the after I remember more. Like, after Garrett, before you. When we met I told you that I'd stopped keeping track of how long I'd been alone, but I lied. It was four hundred and seventy seven days."

Brett reels. Four hundred and seventy seven days. More than a year. Way more than a year - closer to a year and a half. And Liam counted every single one of them.

"I didn't tell you so you'd cry," Liam says, reaching up to brush his cheeks - and that's when Brett becomes aware of the salty tears streaming down them. "It's over now anyway. It's not like I'm alone anymore." 

Brett gets it now. Garrett might not have treated Liam all that well - but Liam's last memories of him are ones in which Garrett showed him care and concern, even when he was in pain, even when he was dying and knew it. Of course Liam wants to excuse his shitty behaviour. 

Brett takes a brief moment to thank Garrett, who's really only a name in his head and a collection of half-told stories, for sending Liam to Ashburton. He survived there. He probably wouldn't have, by the sounds of it, without Garrett's intervention. 

"I didn't tell him I loved him before he died," Liam says. "I should have. I wish I had." 

They all have regrets, Brett too. But he doesn't have any like that.

"Sorry," Liam mumbles. "That's probably weird for you to hear."

It isn't, not really. Brett's old enough that most people he's dated have had ex-significant others; he's used to not being the only person to have loved someone. "I'm glad you're talking about it," he replies. "Maybe it'll help a bit. Besides, it's nice to know more about him... sounds like he saved your life."

There's a long pause; Liam doesn't meet his eyes, swallowing hard. Then, "He did." 

They sit for a few minutes. Brett's getting a little nervous about Tamara not being back yet; he thought she would be, given that she seems to have an uninfected patient on her hands. Or, at least, asymptomatic. They can't guarantee that Liam's not infected - he might be, and just not showing symptoms yet.

"How's Zack doing?" Liam asks eventually.

Brett's not sure what to say; it's true that there's been no evidence of the walker virus in Zack's system. Liam seems to have gotten there fast enough to prevent that. But Zack's also non-responsive in his coma, and shows signs of distress every time they try to bring him out of it.

"He's doing okay," Brett says eventually. "There's no virus."

"Really?" Liam asks quietly. "So how come you haven't woken him up?"

"It's not that simple, buddy," Brett murmurs. "You can't just wake a coma patient up. It doesn't work that way."

"How's it work?" 

Brett smiles a little; Liam looks like he's genuinely curious. "I don't know that either; I'm not actually a doctor, even though the stethoscope might be fooling you." 

"Do you think he'll live?"

Brett hesitates before answering. "He's pretty young," he says softly. "To be in a coma I mean. But... they managed to give him blood transfusions and pack the wound and there's no virus. So, in theory, yeah. He should." 

The door opens; it's Tamara again. "Okay," she says, bustling in. "How's he doing?"

"Perfectly healthy," Brett says, feeling almost faint with relief as he does. 

"Okay. Okay. I need to test his blood." She looks distressed. "Look, sweetie - I don't want you in the hospital, okay? I also don't want you back on the walls. You're going home with Brett and you're staying right there."

"What about the medical supplies?" Brett asks.

"We're sending Stiles," she replies. "He's the quickest and knows what to look for. Take Liam home - I've already sent one of the messengers to tell Logan he's sick. He won't get put back on the job."

Brett does as he's told - gets Liam all suited up in his sick outfit and leads him home. The moment they're in the door, Liam turns to him.

"There are people out there who really need help," he says, his eyes pleading with Brett. "Seriously, Brett, you don't know how bad it is - they need me, why can't I go out if I'm not sick?"

"If you aren't sick, you might have some kind of natural immunity," Brett tries to explain. "And if you do we need you to stay that way so you can give blood samples. We could make a vaccine, maybe. If you haven't been infected." 

Liam's shoulders sag. He looks utterly defeated; he starts pacing the living room, up and down. Pacing is a pretty typical feature that precedes Liam's panic attacks, and so Brett watches him carefully. Liam doesn't seem like he's going to have one, even though it wouldn't particularly shock him if Liam did.

Finally, Liam drops onto the couch. "There's nothing I can do," he says, obviously frustrated. "Is there?"

"You can stay here. Uninfected. That's how you'll help."

"It's not enough." Liam sounds upset; Brett sits down next to him and rubs the back of his neck, watching as Liam melts, almost unwillingly, under his touch. 

"It's gonna have to be for now, Li," he says softly. "Trust me. We're doing everything we can. Everyone is. But nothing is gonna be gained from you throwing your life away to some fever or a bite wound. Absolutely nothing." 

Liam turns to him, looking sad and withdrawn. He leans close, kisses Brett softly, then puts his forehead on Brett's, closing his eyes.

They stay like that for a long time. Brett eventually has to return to the hospital, where there are more fatalities, more bites, more death. 

When he staggers inside again, bone tired, Liam's made some dinner - such as it is, anyway, scrambled eggs with tomatoes grown in the garden and dried deer meat. After that, they shower and collapse into bed. 

Brett tosses and turns long after Liam's fallen asleep, wishing he were awake, wishing he'd touch Brett until Brett fell apart at the seams and was too physically exhausted to continue to keep his eyes open. But Liam needs to rest, too, and so Brett says nothing. He just watches Liam sleep, quietly, his mouth slightly open and his eyes moving behind his eyelids. Brett hopes he's having nice dreams for once.

He touches Liam's forehead briefly, closes his eyes with relief; not sick. No fever. He remembers now, weeks ago - Liam, having puked most of the night and some of the day, crawling miserably into bed with him and trying - in typical Liam fashion - to keep his suffering to himself. But Brett had known by the set of his eyebrows and jaw that he was hurting, somewhere. 

He'd put his hand on Liam's forehead - even though he was still awake, and Brett usually reserves stuff like that for when he's asleep - and watched Liam's eyes drift open briefly before closing again. He left it there the whole night, aware when, at sometime past two in the morning, Liam's temperature had settled back to normal, and he was able to finally rest properly.

After that, he'd put some cold water on the heat rashes on Liam's wrists to soothe them - they looked painful at the time, even though they're gone now.

Brett sits up abruptly, staring at Liam's wrists. Clean. No marks. Even though it's getting warmer, not cooler, and Liam's working more, which means he should, in theory, have heat rashes on a lot of different body parts.

The rashes. Liam had rashes that are now totally gone - right in conjunction with violently vomiting for most of the night. Liam's not immune, he realises. He's already been infected.

He shakes Liam quickly; Liam groans and drags the covers over his head. "What?"

"I need you to get up and come to the hospital with me," Brett says. "Quick, c'mon." 

Liam doesn't question him; he stumbles out of bed, half asleep, and starts getting dressed. Brett watches him - no marks on Liam's torso or legs or anywhere. No heat rashes.

He knows Tamara's on shift tonight; he leads Liam to the hospital in the darkness, with Liam yawning sleepily and dragging his crossbow behind him. All of the scouts have their weapons on them at the moment - with zombies potentially inside, it's too dangerous not to.

Liam winces when they step into the bright lights at the infirmary. "What're we doing here?" he asks, yawning.

Brett doesn't answer, opening the door to Tamara's office without knocking. She looks up, startled. "Brett? Your shift doesn't start for-"

"Have you checked Liam's blood yet?" he interrupts. Liam looks a little more alert - like he's starting to realise that he's not just along the ride because Brett felt like having some company.

"No, not yet-"

"You need to," Brett says desperately. "Look, I think - I think you'll find something. I don't know what, but something." 

"Why?" Tamara stands up and goes to Liam, peering into his eyes and then opening his mouth a little. Liam lets her do it, looking confused, but he's pliant. "Is he showing symptoms? I wouldn't be surprised-"

"No, that's the thing, he's not symptomatic at all," Brett says, irritated. "Trust me, I've been shoving a thermometer into his mouth every two hours-"

"That's true," Liam says, speaking for the first time since they encountered Tamara.

"-and he's still not running a fever and he doesn't have rashes anywhere, but he did three weeks ago."

Tamara's head snaps around. "Three weeks ago?" 

"Those were heat rashes," Liam says slowly. "I told you that."

"Then why are they gone?" Brett demands. "Why don't you have more, and how come I'd never seen them before you ended up puking all night?" 

Liam's silent, staring back at Brett. He looks a little worried now. 

"I'll test it now," Tamara says softly. "I'm going to take another sample, though. Have something to compare. Sit down, chicken."

Liam sits down on the edge of the exam table, putting his crossbow beside him. Brett thinks he's probably too sleepy and bewildered to ask what's really happening here. Brett kind of hopes he's wrong - but if he's right, and Liam's been infected by this before and he's survived, that would mean his blood has antibodies, and that would mean that someone could potentially make a vaccine.

"Do you want Brett to do this, chicken?" Tamara asks him kindly.

Liam nods silently.

"Okay." She passes everything to Brett. "I'm going to get started on the other samples. Come down to the lab when you're done here." 

"Will do." He turns back to Liam as she leaves and wraps the tourniquet around his arm, watching as shivers ripple up Liam's torso.

He looks up. Liam's staring at him. "You okay?" he asks softly - he's talking about Liam's mental health, honestly, because Liam's physically fine. Brett doesn't want him to dissociate and come to with a needle in his arm.

Liam nods.

"Say something?"

"Do you think I made everyone sick?" Liam asks, voice small. 

"No." Brett can say that for sure. "This disease is fast. If you'd spread it, everyone would have been sick weeks ago. And it would explain why your scouting team and Tamara and I aren't sick - you came into direct contact with them when you were probably contagious and symptomatic." 

"How'd I get it?" 

Brett avoids the question; they'll never know where or when Liam picked it up. It must've been on his last scouting trip, but none of his team got sick that Brett's aware of. Plus, knowing doesn't really help anyway. "We don't know if you've even got it yet," he says softly. "I might just be crazy."

"You've never been wrong before, though," Liam replies quietly.

Brett doesn't answer; he gets the needle ready and starts to draw Liam's blood. Liam puts his free hand on the side of Brett's neck, looking away from the needle site - he's getting better with them, but he's still not good with medical situations, especially not when he's tired or stressed.

Brett takes the needle out, puts a cotton wool ball over the site, and uses a pressure bandage to cover the area. "Okay," he says softly. "Let's go meet up with Tamara. See if we can get this worked out." 

Liam nods. He's still shivering.

"Are you cold?" Brett murmurs, concerned as he rubs Liam's arms. "Do you want a blanket?"

Liam nods, so Brett grabs a blanket from Tamara's cupboard. "Here," he says. "Take this with you, okay? Let's go."

"Am I meant to stay here?"

"No, you can come. I mean, you can stay if you want-"

Liam hops off the table and grabs his crossbow. He follows closely behind Brett as they head down the hallway to the lab - which is just the kitchen room of the converted hotel, because it was the only place made of stainless steel that could be easily cleaned. 

He turns to Liam - meaning to ask how his arm is - but even though Liam's following him, he looks pretty out of it. 

"Fuck," Brett murmurs. "Hey. Liam. You with me?"

Liam blinks and focusses on him. "I'm trying to be."

He's not cold, Brett realises. He's trying not to dissociate. One thing Tamara said about dissociation, which seems to have been pretty solid advice so far, is that touching something tactile or soft or comforting would help. Normally, that's Fudge, but Fudge isn't here. Brett hopes the blanket helps.

"Can I do anything?" he asks helplessly. 

"I'm okay. I'm back now." 

"Okay. Let me know if you need anything, okay? Once we're there you can just sit down somewhere and relax."

Liam nods. Soon enough, they're at the lab, and he seems to still be with it - he looks around curiously as they enter.

Brett's relieved to see there's a cot in the corner of the room, probably so Tamara or Dr. Deaton can take short naps if they need to. "You can sit down if you want," he says gently.  
"Mm," Liam replies, noncommittal. Brett doesn't push him. Liam's not stupid; he'll rest if he feels he has to.

He goes to Tamara. She looks up when he gets there, swallowing.

"So?" Brett asks softly.

"I've analysed a few samples," she says softly. "We archive them for as long as we can. This one-" She gestures to the first slide - "is a sample we took after he came back from his day-trip with Malia the week before. Nothing. It's normal."

"Okay."

"And this one was taken right after he came back from the overnight trip," she says, gesturing to the second. "When I gave him his physical, his throat looked red, but he said he felt fine, so I thought it could be thirst and I let him go. There were no rashes then, but he must have already been infected - this sample is swarming with active disease."

Brett feels cold - he turns to look at Liam, who's looking at some of the equipment curiously. He'd known Liam was sick, but he hadn't known how sick. He'd thought it was just a bug or some food poisoning, a twenty-four hour thing that'd go away. He didn't realise that at any point, Liam could have died in their house with Brett none the wiser.

"The rashes must've come up overnight," Brett says softly. "If he didn't have them when he was with you, because he did by the next day. But they weren't under his arms or near his neck and ears, they were on his wrists."

"Could be why he survived - it might be a different strain, or he might just have an amazing immune system." She nods at his hand. "Is that his?"

"Yeah." He hands it over, watching as she puts a drop of blood on the slide, then a drop of solution over the top. 

There's a pause as she gets it under the microscope. He turns to look at Liam - he's finally settled down in one of the chairs, legs crossed, blanket around his shoulders. He looks tired, but not like he's out of it. He even acknowledges Brett looking at him with a half-hearted smile. Brett smiles back, strained.

"There it is," Tamara says quietly. "You were right."

"I was?"

"Yep." She leans back, sighing, looking stunned. "Liam must have been infected when he left with Malia's scouting team. He's teeming with antibodies." She shakes her head. "It doesn't look like it's quite the same strain - when he was sick, what were his symptoms?"

"Fever," Brett says, the first thing that comes to mind. "He spiked a pretty high one at midday but it only lasted half an hour before it came back down, so I didn't bother bringing him in. Vomiting, chills, fatigue. The rash. Pretty standard stuff."

"No seizures? Out of character behaviour?"

"No. He mostly slept."

"Swollen lymph nodes? How long did he run a fever for?"

"No," Brett says. "And less than twenty four hours. He was pretty much okay by the next night - his temperature was back to normal just past midnight." 

She shakes her head. "He must have had a different strain. No matter how good his immune system is, if he'd had the one we're seeing now, he'd be dead."

Brett swallows and glances at Liam, who's staring at them balefully. 

"So what now?"

"Now we see if we can make a vaccine from Liam's blood. We don't need to keep him isolated anymore, at least - with the antibodies he has a much lower chance of being re-infected. Wouldn't hurt to keep him generally away... but he's probably not going to get infected just from talking to people."

Brett's momentarily relieved. Liam's not going to get sick again. He has antibodies. He's fine. Brett can stop worrying obsessively about his health - well, this aspect of his health, anyway.

On the other hand, other people aren't as lucky and they've already had fatalities. Five, to be exact, mostly runners - if anyone has to be sent out to get supplies, it'll be Liam, and he'll likely have to go on his own. The thought turns Brett's stomach. With Stiles gone and Scott and Malia the only other two people with zombie experience... it'll have to be Liam they send. Without Logan knowing.

He goes to Liam. Liam looks up as Brett kneels down in front of him.

"Did you hear all that?" he asks quietly.

Liam shakes his head.

"You're, um." Brett rubs his face, a hand on Liam's knee. "You're not immune," he says, and, when a look of fear passes over Liam's face, amends quickly, "you're also not infected. Look, Liam - you've already been infected. Two weeks ago. Do you remember?"

"I was sick." Liam swallows. "That was it?" 

"Yeah. Different strain. Those weren't heat rashes on your wrists." Brett swallows. "But this is actually sort of good, because according to Tamara, you're teeming with antibodies. She might be able to make a vaccine somehow. It'll be old-school stuff, nothing like what we had before. But yeah. Somehow. We'll do it." 

Liam rubs his face. "Do I have to stay here?" he asks. 

"No," Brett says, surprised. "You can leave if you want."

"Can I go sit with Zack?" he asks.

Brett thinks that's probably a good idea, actually. "Yeah," he says. "I'll come see you when I can, okay?" 

Liam nods and stands up, leaving. Brett watches him go; it's clear to him that Liam feels pretty useless, and that makes Brett feel useless too - being totally unable to soothe him, when Liam needs it the most, probably...

But he's going to sit with Zack, and that'll be good for him, maybe. So Brett gets back to work.

~*~

He's working on doing blood tests when Tamara calls him.

He's pretty slow with it; he's only just been shown the ropes and he still has to clarify stuff, but Tamara and Mrs. McCall don't seem to mind answering his questions. He's got his head over a telescope, eyes blurred with tiredness, hands shaking a little. He's fatigued and probably needs to eat. 

"Brett!" Tamara calls, her voice heavy with fear.

Brett jolts to full alertness, stands up and hurries to her. "What's up?"

"We have a bite victim outside the infirmary," she says, voice cracking. "I just ran the sample. He's infected."

Brett's heart drops. "What?"

"We've been backed up on samples because of the outbreak - we need to find him, get him contained before he turns and hurts his family - I'll send Liam down there-"

"No," Brett says quickly. "Liam's one of our only healthy scouts. We aren't sending him." _He's also my boyfriend who's dissociated twice in the last few hours and really needs a fucking break_. "It's just one guy. I'll find him."

"Be careful, okay?" Tamara worries. "I don't know when the sample was taken." 

Brett's pulling his jacket on. "How'd he slip through the radar?" he demands.

"We're behind on all the samples because so many people have been coming through - just hurry, okay?" 

"Got it." He's out the door quickly, swipes a knife from the lobby - enough to defend himself, if he really has to.

He doesn't know the O'Tooles very well - Liam's mentioned Mr. O'Toole once or twice, as someone who's on the scouting teams. Liam doesn't like him. He's never said it - he doesn't think, despite all Liam's tics and neuroses and pet peeves, he's ever heard Liam outright state he doesn't like anyone, or been malicious about anyone in the town, even though it must be tempting. But Brett knows Liam, and he knows when Liam says, "He's kind of... loud," that what he's really saying is, "he's dangerous to the scouting teams and shoots his mouth off." 

Brett's careful as he steps up to the house; it's quiet, even though he knocks. "Mr. O'Toole?" he calls quietly. "It's Brett. Tamara's worried about you..." 

No reply. Brett sighs uneasily, then twists the doorknob; it opens easily. He swallows and enters.

The whole lower floor is empty. That becomes obvious. So he heads up the stairs, slowly, listening; he can't hear any signs of life. 

"Mr. O'Toole?" he asks quietly. He knows it's dumb to call out. He knows. But he has to find the guy - and his family, wherever they are, need to be kept safe. He's got two kids, Brett remembers vaguely. And a wife.

"Mr. O'Toole?"

He enters the master bedroom. Nothing. He backs out.

He hears the snarl first - whips around to find Mr. O'Toole, right behind him. Or, well, Mr. O'Toole's reanimated corpse; he's too late.

He's about to lunge, a stabbing motion, when a weight falls against his side, and he shoots a hand out to stop it - it's a kid, and Brett's hands barely land on him and shove him away, just in time to stop him from biting into the flesh of Brett's side. Another one. A fucking kid zombie, Jesus. 

Shoving the kid away costs him his advantage on Mr. O'Toole; he's pinned to the wall, suddenly, with the older guy's weight on him, his breath rancid and eyes only slightly clouded. He hasn't been dead that long. 

He shoves, but his knife is positioned awkwardly now, the blade near his wrist, and he can't get any leverage - all he can think is thank God it's not Liam, because Liam's small and would've been easily pinned by now.

He wouldn't have been dumb enough to get into this situation, Brett scolds himself, shoving bodily at Mr. O'Toole. And there might be more, too - his wife and other kid. Are there other zombies? Corpses waiting to reanimate? He doesn't know, and-

Brett grunts as he feels a sting on his right hand, the blade of his knife, probably, nicking him. The kid - so recently turned his eyes are still brown - is snarling at him, snapping, as Brett holds Mr. O'Toole off him.

He hears a scream and jerks his head up to see Gemma - the youngest kid - standing there, petrified. Her noise gives Brett his chance; Mr. O'Toole turns, and Brett gets the knife through the kid's head, and then takes out the dad from behind.

"Gemma," he breathes.

"Mommy's not breathing," she hiccups.

"Where is she?"

Gemma grabs his hand and runs down the hallway, Brett in tow. There she is - prone, on the carpet, eyes closed. Brett falls to his knees beside her, searches for a pulse - finds one, very weak, in her neck.

He starts chest compressions straight away, listening to Gemma cry. She's young enough to still call her mother mommy, and if that isn't heartbreaking, Brett doesn't know what is. 

"Come on," Brett moans. "Come on, Mrs. O'Toole-"

He doesn't know her first name. He only knows Gemma because she had a cold a few weeks ago and he saw her for it, then referred her on to Tamara. 

He does chest compressions for almost five minutes - he even tries orally resuscitating her, the disease be damned, because he's got at least some immunity afforded to him by exposure to Liam. Nothing. He checks her pulse again - and it's gone.

He leans back. She's wearing a white shirt; there's blood on it. Brett wonders miserably if her kid or husband took a chunk out of her before she died, or even while she was fitting on the carpet.

"Mommy?" Gemma asks tremulously.

He looks up at her. He doesn't know what to say. He leans back over Mrs. O'Toole, closes her eyes properly - notices that despite the blood on her shirt, there's no hole in it.  
He blinks. His hand stings. He looks down.

For a moment, he really does think it's a knife wound - but he hesitates, then thinks, just to be sure. And he uses his sleeve to wipe away the blood on the fleshy, soft heel of his palm. 

Teeth marks, in a crescent shape. The whole wound is only an inch across, maybe an inch and a half wide. But the skin is broken, there's blood, and teeth marks, and the wound site is stinging viciously. 

Brett stares at the bite wound, the crescent mark, on his hand, blankly. He didn't even feel it happen - it's small, so it had to have been the kid that did it. It's broken the skin, though, and it's a bite, and he's been sitting here for almost ten minutes now - how long has it been since he was bitten? Fifteen? Twenty? It doesn't matter. It's too long. 

Too late for amputation. The reality sets in. He can't amputate. Within hours he'll feel the telltale burn of fever. 

His first thought isn't "I'm going to die". His first thought is that this is the second boyfriend Liam's lost to a bite - that he's the only person Liam trusts, and Liam's going to lose him. Liam, who's got God knows how many issues to deal with, is going to be alone. 

"Brett?" Gemma whimpers.

"Sorry," he says quietly. "Look away."

She does. Brett uses his Stanley knife to pierce her mother's skull to prevent reanimation. As he does, he has the sudden, soul-crushing thought that he doesn't want Liam to have to put him down. 

He could end it now. Mr. O'Toole has guns. But - no. He's selfish, and he wants to say goodbye. 

"Come on," Brett says to Gemma. "We're going to the hospital so you can have some medicine."

"Will it make me better?" 

"Yeah, sweetie, it will." He carries her. His hand throbs. The infection's started already. He's not going to have long. 

To his horror, Liam's waiting at the hospital, pacing anxiously. And isn't this both their worst fears come true? That one would die and leave the other alone? Brett had always wanted to go first, just so he didn't have to watch Liam's death. Now, Brett thinks it would be kinder if it were him left behind. 

Brett takes Gemma to an exam room and passes her off silently to a nurse, Liam on his heels the whole time. The worst part is that Liam looks relieved - there are no particularly obvious bites, and Liam thinks he's fine, until he catches sight of Brett's bloody sleeve.

"You're bleeding," Liam says, pulling Brett's hand closer. "Should probably get it patched..."

His voice trails off; Brett stares helplessly, wishing he could freeze time and stop the spreading look of realisation, then helplessness, then despair, from taking over Liam's face.   
He might die. But Liam will be the one who lives with it. 

"When did this happen?" Liam chokes.

"About twenty minutes ago," Brett says softly.

Liam whimpers, pressing his hands against his eyes. "She should've sent me. I told her to send me-"

"Don't blame her, Liam. She wanted to. I told her not to."

"We need to amputate it," Liam croaks, grabbing his good hand. "Brett, c'mon, we have to-"

"Liam, you know that won't work." Brett's trying not to cry. "You know it won't, baby. It's already throbbing. If I'm gonna die I at least want to be able to touch you with both hands. I don't want to lose it now."

Liam opens his mouth to reply - and then an expression of hope flickers over his face. "What about the coma?" he asks desperately. Then, before Brett can answer, he's taking off, yelling for Tamara.

Everything moves quickly after that - within ten minutes, Brett's on a gurney and having his hand looked at and there are people squabbling above him. Liam's watching him, and his eyes are wet but he isn't crying, not yet. 

"Brett," Tamara calls, and Brett blinks, snapping out of it to look at her. "We're putting you under, chicken," she says. "Give your body time to fight it off. Now, look, in terms of decisions-"

"Will this work?" he asks.

"We don't know," Dr. Deaton says softly. 

Brett hesitates, but only for a moment. It definitely won't work if he doesn't let them try. "Okay," he says. "And do everything you have to do. Amputations, I don't care what. But if I'm not gonna make it switch me off." Fuck, he doesn't want to be a vegetable, to slowly digest his own body and rot and waste and take up time and resources and consume and consume. He might as well be a zombie for all that.

She nods. "Alright. Let's do this."

He's unsure of what they're really doing. Wires are run in and out of him and eventually, one of the nurses brings out the gas mask. Brett swallows, feels the first real pang of terror, as she instructs him to lie back and count back from one hundred.

As he does, Liam leans over him, gives him a lingering kiss, then pulls back to let the nurse put the mask over his face. Brett's head starts swimming immediately. _No_ , he thinks, fingers on his infected hand scrabbling against the mattress. _I don't want to..._

"Go to sleep," Liam whispers, his voice breaking, and his fingers are wrapped around Brett's. "You'll feel better when you wake up."

_When_ , not _if_.

"Count back from a hundred, sweetie," the nurse prompts.

"Ninety nine." _When, not if._ "Ninety eight." _Liam's only eighteen. I can't leave Liam on his own._ "Ninety seven..."

He's gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please don't hate me.


	23. Chapter Twenty Three - Dum Vita Est Spes Est

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So first of all, I'm very sorry about the last chapter. Lol.
> 
> Second, there are **trigger warnings for this chapter: dissociation, mentions of suicide and self harm** , and just a general onslaught of misery.
> 
> Thank you for the feedback on the last chapter! :D

**Chapter Twenty Three - Dum Vita Est Spes Est**

**Liam's P.O.V**

The first coherent memory Liam has of that first week is the second day.

He has no idea what happened the first day. When he eventually comes around from what must have been his longest blackout to date, Scott and Stiles have pretty much moved in with him.

The second coherent memory he has is that he goes to stand and they both nearly fall of their chairs with shock. "Liam?" Scott asks carefully.

Liam clears his throat weakly. "How're all the sick people?" is the first thing he thinks to ask. He doesn't want to know anything about Brett. If Brett's dead and they don't tell him, technically Brett's not dead. At least, not to him.

They shoot worried glances at each other. "The sick people?"

"The." Liam swallows, feeling confused - was it all a dream? "The... people with the virus. Are they...?"

"Tamara's making a vaccine," Stiles says. "Using your blood. Do you remember giving it?"

"No." 

Now they both look like they're losing it. Liam tries to remember, but he really doesn't remember consenting to having his blood drawn. He must have, and they must have thought he was genuinely with it at the time. Just to check, he looks down at his elbows - his right is covered with a pressure bandage and cotton swab, a dark brown stain showing through.

He rubs his face. "Sorry."

"Don't apologise, dude, it's okay," Scott says hurriedly. "You need anything?"

He shakes his head. "I'm gonna go shower." 

Once he's in there, he sits down under the freezing spray of water and tries not to lose it again. But now it's really hitting him - Brett's been bitten and he's in a coma and it might not work. It might not stop the spread of the disease. He could still die. He could be dead right now. 

With that, he shuts the shower off and climbs out hastily, dries off and yanks his clothes back on, runs back out into the living room. It's only Scott here now; they must've decided two people was just too overwhelming for him.

"Is Brett still alive?" His voice breaks.

"Yeah." Scott nods earnestly. "Yeah, Liam, he's alive. That's all I know though. Tamara's been sending people with updates. And my mom's watching him."

Liam sags weakly against the doorframe. "Okay." 

Scott looks nervous. "You wanna stay with us for a while? You know, until..."

He doesn't add "until you're better" to the end of his sentence, which Liam is immensely grateful for. Because he isn't gonna be magically better. He somehow knows, deep down, that he's totally in the grip of the stupid generalised anxiety disorder, still teetering on the cusp of dissociating. They're trying to watch out for him.

"Yeah." He feels frazzled. "Okay." 

~*~

He spends two nights with Stiles and Scott. 

Their dynamic is weird, and he's not the only one who notices it - when he's there, that is. He's usually with Brett, doing absolutely nothing except staring at him and holding his hand and begging him silently to wake up.

Scott knows Stiles is acting strangely. Liam can tell. Stiles is more abrasive than usual, more snappish, even with Liam, even when Scott scolds him for it. Liam doesn't care. At least someone's treating him like he's made of more than glass. 

Liam's guessing, by the way they're acting, that Stiles hasn't told Scott how he feels. He wasn't exactly planning on letting the cat out of the bag, but seriously. The amount of time they're spending squabbling uselessly over his mental health - and Jesus, he's in the room, he can fucking hear them - and asking endlessly about Brett has him feeling a little defensive.

"So, uh," Scott says. "How's-"

"I have an idea," Liam says, sitting back in his chair and reaching down to feed Fudge a strip of meat. "How about we don't talk about Brett? Or anything else I'm trying to forget about? I've got a really interesting topic. Stiles wants to wine you, dine you, and then probably bang you." He crosses his arms. "Discuss." 

There's silence for a moment. Scott stares at Stiles, Stiles stares at Liam, and Liam feeds Fudge from his untouched plate of food. 

"Stiles?" Scott asks.

"That wasn't exactly how I planned on you finding out," Stiles says, narrowing his eyes at Liam.

"I'm glad I know."

It's getting too mushy for Liam's liking; he stands up. "Have fun," he says. "I'm gonna go home. Maybe sleep for a year." 

"Liam," Scott calls worriedly.

"I really wanna be alone - no offense," Liam says quietly. "Just... will you two suck it up and bang each other already?" 

They both stare at him as he leaves. The walk home is quiet; the only sound is Fudge's claws clicking against the pavement. He's followed Liam everywhere, loyally, ever since Brett was bitten. At least Liam's not totally alone, even though, despite everyone's best efforts, he feels like he is. 

They aren't Brett. Right now, he wants Brett, more than anything, more than ever. And he doesn't know how to cope with the fact that Brett's not dead, not yet, but could be any second or minute or day. Should he start grieving now and get it over and done with? Or should he just try to staunchly believe that Brett will be okay and muddle through everything with that in mind? He doesn't know. 

When he gets home, he catches sight of his own face in the bathroom mirror and winces. The scruffy, half-grown beard of grief really doesn't suit him.

He opens up the bathroom cupboard, intending to shave, and finds all the razors gone. He blinks, checks the cupboard under the sink. They aren't there either.

"I'm on suicide watch," he realises aloud. 

They took all the razors. When he goes to the kitchen, anything tougher than a butter knife is gone too. He's floored. Has he really been so bad that they genuinely thought he'd kill himself?

Then again, he did dissociate for a whole day. There is that. 

There's no point trying to convince anyone that he wants his damn kitchen knives back, so he goes back to Stiles and Scott's house. Fudge huffs, like he's annoyed that Liam's doing so much switching between houses.

When he gets there, he doesn't knock. He enters the kitchen, finds them still at the dinner table. They look surprised to see him.

"Hi, Liam," Scott says hesitantly.

"Don't mind me." He starts towards their bathroom. "Just here to shave." 

They both wince. Liam's sort of flattered people care enough to keep all the sharp things away from him, but they totally skipped over all the bottles of medication in the house he could've easily overdosed on. He wonders if telling them that will get them to give his things back, or whether they'll think he's considered it. He decides not to try in the end.

Fudge sits at his feet faithfully while Liam shaves, so close he gets bits of shaving cream on his nose. Liam's about to bend down and clean it up when Fudge licks it off curiously, then whines.

"Yeah, that's not edible, buddy," Liam says, rubbing Fudge's ears. He vows to get him a bone or something on the way home - he's been following Liam around without complaint, and Stiles told him that he stayed with Liam the entire day he was out, not leaving his side, not even to eat.

He finishes shaving, rinses off in the mirror. He hasn't cut himself once this time around, hasn't missed any patches. Brett taught him really well how to avoid his Adam's apple and the sharper parts of his jaw and the soft, fragile area beneath his nose.

Liam takes a deep, wobbling breath, watching his eyes mist and get red in the bathroom mirror. His ears are ringing. He wants to go see Brett, but Brett's not really there. Right now, he's just a body and a tangled, mechanical web of tubes and wires and machines.

Fudge barks, whines, and puts his paws up on the counter so he can crane his neck and lick Liam's newly-shaven neck and chin. His ears are back against his skull, tail down. He's even scaring his dog. 

Liam shakes his head, blinks, wipes away a few of the stray tears that result from the action, and pats Fudge's head. "Okay," he says, and his voice seems small in the bathroom. "Yeah. Okay."

He cleans the sink area up and puts everything away, then exits the bathroom. Stiles is sitting out in the hallway, and he vaults to his feet when Liam steps out, rubbing the back of his head sheepishly and trying to look casual.

"Good shave?" he asks. "Scotty always gets the blunt razors and I'm always telling him to get sharper ones but he says there are other people who need the sharper ones more. You look pretty clean though, so I guess they worked for you. Next time, though, I-"

"I know you're not gonna believe me," Liam interrupts, "but you really don't need to worry about me killing myself."

Stiles stares at him, holding his breath, like Liam's sucked the atmosphere out of the room. Sometimes he forgets that other people aren't accustomed to his bluntness - he hasn't had to be delicate for so long that it feels foreign to tiptoe around the very obvious elephant in the room. But other people don't work like that. They're gentle and delicate and Liam knows it comes from a place of concern and care, but he'd really appreciate someone being straight-up with him for once. 

"Just being cautious," Stiles says eventually.

Liam shrugs. "I get it," he mumbles. "Just expect me to show up every so often to shave." 

"Right," Stiles breathes. "You aren't going to ask for anything back?"

"What would be the point in that? You'll say no anyway." 

"It's... not because we don't trust you, Liam, we..." Stiles sounds uncharacteristically unsure of what to say to him next. Nobody seems to know what to say to him. They're all waiting to jump to his aid and stop him doing something stupid, but in the meantime, they've forgotten he's actually a person who knows he's being treated differently. 

Liam tries to smile. It doesn't really work. "Yeah. Like I said. I get it." He rubs the back of his neck. "I'm gonna get out of here," he says. 

"You can stay if you want, Liam."

"I - I don't really want to. No offence. I just - yeah." 

"Okay."

Liam heads off down the hallway and stairs; Stiles follows him to the door. Once he's there, he turns around.

"You're welcome," he says. "For telling Scott. Next time I come back I want to be disgusted by how in love you two are, so, you know. Get to it."

"Thank you, wise dating coach," Stiles says dryly. 

"No problem."

~*~

He goes to the inventory area to see if there are any bones for Fudge.

He keeps his head pretty much down - nobody's really seen him for a while and he knows they're watching him. Fudge stays right by his side, not running ahead even when the smell of food is invading Liam's nose.

His stomach turns. He's barely eaten lately and quite frankly he doesn't feel like it, even though he knows he has to. He just... doesn't really see much of a point.

When he gets to the inventory building, Savannah is outside - James must be working today, he realises. He likes their family - it's just James, his wife Amala, and Savannah, but they clearly love each other and they're always watching out for other people. It makes Liam feel good to know that every deer, possum and squirrel he brings back feeds them.

"Hi, Liam!" Savannah calls cheerfully. "Hi, Fudge!"

Liam smiles a little. "Hi, Sav." When he gets close enough, she stands up - she's been playing with some jumping jacks on the pavement - and hugs him tightly around the waist.  
He hugs her back. He hasn't had anyone be that sure of themselves around him in a while. "What're you doing?"

"Jumping jacks," she says, hugging Fudge as well. "Daddy told me to wait out here while he works."

"Is he inside?"

"Yeah! Want me to show you?" 

"That'd be great." He watches her gather her jumping jacks into a pouch, remembering when he was completely obsessed with them as a kid and he wouldn't come inside until it was too dark out to see them on the road. His mom used to scrub his hands in the sink, black with the tar from the road, and sigh, but she would always be smiling.

He's gotta stop thinking about people who are dead. It's fucking him up. He chews on the inside of his mouth to stop himself from crying as Savannah takes his hand and leads him inside. He really doesn't want to explain to a six year old why he's sobbing like a baby.

"Savannah!" James' voice is slightly scolding. "I thought I told you to wait outside."

"You did, Daddy, but Liam needed my help finding you," she says, puffing her chest out proudly.

James looks at him, his eyes soft and kind. "Hi, Liam," he says.

"Hey." James can probably tell he's about to cry, but he won't say anything. "I was wondering if you had any bones or anything. For Fudge?" 

"Oh, yeah, plenty. Come out back." He pats Savannah's hair. "Wait out the front, sweetie."

"Okay," she sighs, letting Liam go and trudging back to the front. 

Liam watches her. "Wants to help, huh?"

"Daddy's little girl," James says, smiling faintly. "I meant to thank you. She was inoculated against the disease two days ago. We both were." 

"Oh." Liam tries to smile. "Cool. I'm glad." 

James smiles back to him as he claps Liam on the back and leads him to where the bones are. They don't keep them for very long - there's no way to stop them from rotting and smelling - but there are some still here from the last hunt the scouts did. 

Fudge sits, wriggles forward a little, and whines, drooling onto the pavement. He knows he can't take straight off the pile, but he's always tempted.

Liam grabs the biggest bone he can find - a hind leg bone, he thinks - and wraps it up in plastic. "Thanks," he says. "Fudge has been following me everywhere. Figured he deserved a treat." 

James nods, looking at him, assessing. "How're you doing, Liam?"

Liam shrugs, looking away. "Been better I guess." That's the understatement of the year; he was better when he'd been fucking shanked by that Keeper. At least then he had Brett. 

"If you need anything... let us know, okay?" James asks. "Anything."

"I'm just..." Liam shrugs. James sort of reminds him of his stepdad in a way, which is probably why Liam finds himself reluctantly spilling his guts so frequently. "I just need something to do," he says. "To keep busy. Nobody's letting me do anything." 

James nods thoughtfully, watching him. "Are you good at building things?"

"I'm pretty good," Liam says, not sure where this is going. "Why?" 

"Well, I have a job for you, I think. And, if you take it, a six-year-old girl will be indebted to you for the rest of her life." 

~*~

"Can you pass me that, Sav?"

She hefts the hammer up and gives it to him, her tiny arms straining under the weight. "Will I ever be strong like you?" she whines.

Liam smiles at her as he hammers a nail in place. "Yeah. I'm sure. You're just a kid though." 

"Am not," she grumbles.

"Are too."

"Am not!"

"Are too." 

"You're silly, Liam."

"You're sillier."

"Liam!"

He can't help but laugh; being around Savannah is doing wonders for his disposition. There's no expectation with her to be anything or do anything; to her, it's all normal, apart from crying - and the one time he did stop to cry, thinking about the time he and Brett patched up the hole in their tiny apartment at Ashburton, Savannah brought out her toy doctor kit and "diagnosed" him with a booboo, which she promptly covered with a bandaid. 

He's still got it - it's kind of annoying to have a plaster on his collarbone, where it's always tugging, but she thinks she fixed him, and he doesn't want to discourage her. Besides, she was pretty handy with her toy stethoscope, and Liam's thinking maybe she should be a nurse at the hospital when she's older. 

Savannah peers at him through the tiny window he's made. "Is this gonna be my cubby?"

"Yup. All yours. It's even midget-sized, just like you," he teases. 

He reminds himself to thank James and Amala. When he'd told James he didn't have anything to do, James had promptly given him a shitload of wood, nails, and tools, and told him that he's been promising to build Savannah a cubby house now that the weather's nicer, but hasn't had time.

The best part is that neither of them are supervising. It's just him, a task to distract himself with, Savannah, and Fudge - who's basking in the sun with his bone, eyes lolling with happiness.

This is the second day he's worked on the cubby house. It's coming along pretty quickly; he's always been good with tools and building things, not so much with academics. Plus, it's small, which helps.

Savannah leans on the window. "How did you learn?" she asks curiously.

"To build?" 

"Yeah."

"My stepdad taught me. I grew up in Texas for most of my life."

"That's where all the cowboys are, right?"

He laughs. "Yeah."

"Are you a cowboy?"

"No. I didn't finish my cowboy training." 

"That's sad."

"I know. I'm pretty torn up over it." 

She nods solemnly. "It'll be okay," she assures him. "I bet you can still finish."

"Probably. I need to find a hat first though. And some cowboy boots. You can't be a cowboy without either of those. Can you pass me the nails?"

"Please."

"Please," he amends, smiling, and she hands him the nails.

~*~

He stays at James and Amala's place while he builds the cubby. It's only after he's finished, a few days later, that he realises he hasn't actually been home to do anything more than change his clothes.

The silence inside his house is unnerving. Fudge trots down the hall to the bedroom; Liam goes to the shower and rinses himself off, trying not to think about the fact that the second-to-last time they had sex, it was in here. They had no idea what was coming. 

If they had, Liam probably would've sucked it up right then and there and told Brett he loved him, potential emotional ruin be damned. He should've said it earlier, and now he's left with the same regret he had after Garrett died.

He climbs out of the shower and heads into the bedroom. The bed's unmade from the last time they slept here - and Liam realises he hasn't slept here since the bite. The Bite. It deserves capital letters in his head, a life changing event. A life ruining event, more like. 

Fudge is already on the bed. He whines at Liam quietly.

Liam takes one look at Brett's side - the smushed corner of the pillow where Brett puts his head, because he doesn't use them like a normal person, the stack of books on the bedside table, a pack of condoms and some lube. When Liam goes closer, he swears he can smell Brett's lingering scent.

His throat closes over. _I can't sleep here. I can't sleep here._

He turns around and leaves. Fudge follows him out the front door; Liam wanders aimlessly down the main street before deciding to head to the infirmary. He feels heavy and headachy and tired and just... not right. Like something's missing. He knows what it is. Who it is.

He goes to Brett's room, stops outside the door, and then backs away. He can't go in there right now. Brett's not Brett and Liam just needs to not think about that for a while.

He turns, looks around. Decides to go to Tamara's office. It's as good a place as any. Fudge follows him as he finds it, then knocks on the door.

"Come in."

He shuffles inside. "Hi," he mumbles.

Tamara looks up. "Hi, chicken," she says, seeming surprised. "What's wrong?"

Liam shrugs; he doesn't really feel like admitting that he just really doesn't want to be alone but doesn't really feel safe around anyone, either, even people he normally would. Plus, Brett's here, and he's close to Brett. "Nothing," he lies, unconvincing to even his own ears.

She gives him a small, sympathetic smile. "What's really wrong?"

"I don't feel well," he says, and even though he doesn't mean it the way she evidently takes it - she's up out of her chair and hurrying to him before he can clarify - it's not a lie, either. He doesn't feel well. He's not sick, but he's also not hungry; he's tired but he can't sleep. And apart from that, everything just feels off and wrong and awful. 

She feels his forehead, gently - smoothing his hair back like his own mom used to when he had a fever and couldn't sleep. Then she peers into his eyes.

"You don't feel warm."

Liam shrugs again.

There's a pause, and then Tamara gestures to the cot in the corner of the room. It looks cozy, piled high with pillows and blankets. "How about you rest here for a while, if you aren't feeling too well?" she asks gently. "Take a nap. I'm staying here to run some tests all afternoon."

"I don't wanna bother you," he mumbles.

"You aren't bothering me, chicken. You look like you could fall asleep where you're standing." She rubs his shoulders a little; he's taller than her, but not by much. "Rest, sweetheart."

He's never met anyone who could call him sweetheart without him scowling that wasn't his mom, but Tamara's different. He heads over to the cot and kicks his shoes off, curls up beneath the blankets on it, and watches sleepily as Fudge pads over to him. 

"Why is this here?" he asks.

"I sleep whenever and wherever I can," she sighs. "Just part of being a doctor. Your patients need you at inconvenient times."

"Is Brett inconvenient?" Liam asks sleepily.

He sees how heartbroken her expression is. "Never, chicken."

Liam nods. 

~*~

_Liam doesn't remember coming around from surgery for the first time, although apparently he was doped up to his eyeballs with painkillers and sedatives, so that's probably why._

_The second time he comes around, he's caught in a web of groggy, hazy pain. His side aches with every beat of his heart. He hurts. Fuck, he hurts._

_"Liam, sweetie? Can you hear me?"_

_The voice is only vaguely familiar, and not enough to be comforting; Liam tries opening his eyes, but he's really tired, and he's in pain, and he wants to be left alone. He shirks back a little, trying to escape the hands touching lightly at his chest._

_"He could be having an adverse reaction to the sedatives," another voice murmurs._

_"Maybe. Look, I could probably change his bandages - I could force him - but I don't really want to. Will someone go get Brett? That might calm him down."_

_Liam drifts. His chest is cold; he doesn't think he's wearing a shirt. He thinks his fingers and hands might be shaking, too - he's still in pain, and he feels weak, and the last time he was like this, he was dying._

_The sound of a door opening catches what little attention he has; it shuts again soon after. "He's okay?" Brett's voice asks, worriedly. "He-"_

_"He won't let us change his bandages," the original voice replies quietly. "He keeps pushing us away. We could probably force it, but we didn't want him to stress out."_

_"Okay."_

_Brett's scent envelopes him, then, and the bed dips; Brett's sitting right beside him, instead of in the chair. He feels a hand on his forehead, lingering gently, before it passes over his hair. "He isn't feverish or anything," Brett murmurs._

_Lam wants so badly to open his eyes and look, to see Brett's face and know that he really is there, so he tries. God, does he try. He just manages to get them open in time to see Brett turning his head, away from Liam, and hear him say, "How long has he been awake?"_

_"Awake?"_

_"Yeah. If he was asleep he wouldn't be resisting."_

_Liam finds Brett's hand on the mattress, gives his sleeve a weak tug. His throat is so dry he can't fathom speaking, but he doesn't have to - Brett turns to him right away, his face softening into a relieved smile._

_"Hey, buddy. You doing okay?"_

_Liam swallows, tries speaking even though the only noise that comes out is a pitiful croak. Brett reaches over and grabs something, out of his field of vision._

_When he comes back, Liam realises it's a cup with a straw in it. Brett tilts the straw towards his face, and Liam sucks down about as much water as Brett will let him. Eventually, though, and too soon, Brett's taking the cup away from him._

_"Nobody's gonna steal it." His voice is laced with fondness. "You wanna try talking again? Can you tell me how you feel?"_

_"Side hurts," Liam answers, his voice wrecked._

_Brett turns to that unseen person in the corner. "Is that-"_

_"We had to dial back on the pain medication," the other person says - a woman named Tamara, Liam thinks. "It gets addictive quickly and we have a limited supply. We've got him on a low dose, though."_

_"Okay." Brett turns back to him. "You hear all that?"_

_Liam nods, once._

_"Alright." His hand is back on Liam's forehead, stroking gently. "You're okay. Wanna let the nurses change your bandages now?"_

_Liam doesn't, really, and when Tamara ventures close again, he can't help but flinch. He doesn't know these people, and he recognises vaguely that he's too drugged and in too much pain to realise they're trying to help him._

_"You've changed bandages before, haven't you?" Tamara asks Brett softly._

_"Yeah. Why?"_

_"How about you try? Look, I would, but - he's shaking, and I don't want to scare him or hurt him."_

_"I'll do it," Brett says quickly. "I'm happy to." He looks back at Liam. "That okay? If I change your bandages?"_

_"Mhm," Liam mumbles._

_With that, Brett reaches for his side, and Liam feels the odd sensation of something pulling without really being aware of what or where it is. He realises, with the quiet ripping noise accompanying it, that Brett's peeling the tape off his side._

_"Stitches look good," Tamara murmurs, peering at him. "Still, we'll take his temperature to be sure."_

_This sucks. Liam can definitively say that; he's not sure how Brett's going to be attracted to him again when he's seeing Liam lying here, weak, in pain, probably catheterised, and with about a million different holes and tubes poked into him._

_Brett and Tamara murmur above him as they work. Finally, Brett's smearing some antibiotic cream onto his fingers, then applying it to Liam's side._

_"Ow," Liam breathes weakly, startled by the sudden flare of pain in the area._

_"Sorry," Brett whispers, smoothing Liam's hair back. "Shit. Sorry, Liam." He's gentler after that, but the process still stings; Liam's relieved to have a cold bandage over the wound.  
_

_Next up is the thermometer. Liam doesn't mind this part too much, because all he has to do is lie here and let the thing get a read on him. Brett looks relieved when it goes off._

_"You're all good, baby. No fever. That's great."_

_"He needs to eat something," Tamara says softly. "Anything."_

_"Can you eat?" Brett asks hopefully._

_Liam's stomach turns. "No," he mumbles back._

_"Okay, we'll give it an hour, check again once he's had another dose of the anti-emetic," Tamara murmurs. "I'll leave you two alone for a while."_

_She leaves; Brett leans closer to Liam and gives him a little kiss on the mouth. Liam wants more, but he can't chase Brett up._

_"You cold?" Brett asks. "You're shaking."_

_"Little bit." Full sentences feel like a lot of work._

_Brett unzips his hoodie - the really thick, heather gray one Liam loves to steal from him. "Here," he says with a smile, draping it over Liam's chest and shoulders. "Maybe once you're better we can actually get your arms into it. For now this'll work."_

_Liam finally opens his eyes, properly, and takes a moment to find Brett. When he does, he blinks at him drowsily; Brett looks really clean and soft and he smells like warmth and like familiarity. He gives Liam a gentle smile when he sees Liam's eyes focus._

_Liam blinks again. The light is behind Brett's head, lighting him up from behind. "You look like an angel," he mumbles, tugging Brett's hoodie closer to him clumsily._

_Brett's smile widens. "I must be one jacked up looking angel."_

_"No," Liam mumbles, then turns his head to nuzzle Brett's hand when he tucks the hoodie and blanket closer. "You're a great angel." He feels sort of like everything is happening underwater; he's exhausted, but not enough to sleep, really. "Um..."_

_"You want some more water?" Brett asks._

_"Mm, please."_

_He drinks more slowly this time, remembering what Brett said about nobody stealing it. Brett's patient with him, holding the cup and straw close to his face for as long as he thinks Liam's going to go back to it._

_Eventually, he puts the cup aside. "How're you feeling?"_

_Liam yawns. "Better."_

_He's calmer, for sure. He doesn't like being surrounded by people when his walls are up, so being surrounded by people when he can barely fathom moving is kind of frightening for him. But they're gone and Brett's here, and that's pretty good._

_"How long have I been here?" Liam asks, finally feeling like he's capable of a full sentence. Brett leans closer to hear him; he must be speaking quietly._

_"About half a day," Brett says softly. "You were awake a while ago. Do you remember?"_

_Liam shakes his head a little. "Did I say anything dumb?"_

_Brett chuckles. "No. You were pretty out of it. I think you'll feel a little more awake by tomorrow."_

_Tomorrow. Liam's already dozing off. Tomorrow, it'll feel a little better._

~*~  


"Liam." 

He opens his eyes; Tamara's shaking his shoulder a little. "I'm going home, sweetie," she whispers. 

He starts sitting up. "Guess I'd better go home too, then."

"I was thinking you could come around for dinner," she says, almost awkwardly. "How long has it been since you had a well-rounded meal?"

_Stew. Two nights before Brett got bitten. He made it so we wouldn't have to worry about having meals there over the next few days, because he knew we wouldn't have time. I didn't finish it._

He shrugs. Tamara gives him a soft, sympathetic look. "I'm making lasagne," she says.

He gets out of the bed; Fudge rises with him and follows him as he goes to leave with her. "How?" he asks. "I mean... with the power and stuff..."

He doesn't feel like talking, but he does feel obligated to keep up conversations with people when they try to engage with him - like he's trying to make them think he's okay. If he laid down in the middle of the road right now and let a car drive over him a few times, it would make almost no difference to the quality of his life. He'd just have a reason to be in the hospital, near Brett, more often.

"Well, it's not typical lasagne." Tamara's voice sounds like it's underwater. Liam knows he's about to dissociate, black out, or something, but he doesn't care. He wants to, even. "I mean I don't really have cheese, but I make do with - Liam?" 

He looks up; she's taken his hand, gently, and is rubbing it between hers. When she smiles at him, her eyes look glossy, like she's about to cry.  
"That's it, chicken," she encourages softly. "You're okay. Do you need anything?"

_Brett. I need Brett._

"No thank you," he says instead. "Sorry."

"You have nothing to apologise for."

~*~

Tamara's house is even smaller than theirs. One bedroom, a living room that doubles as a dining room, and an en-suite bathroom.

"I like enclosed spaces," she explains. "And nobody else wanted it."

"Do you get lonely?" he asks awkwardly, sitting on the couch when she motions that he can.

"Hmm, not really. I'm not here enough to get lonely. Mostly I'm at the hospital looking after you guys." She smiles.

"You do a good job." He's shivering a little, even though it's not cold - he knows he's going to dissociate pretty shortly. He feels like he should warn her, but he doesn't know how, and he's not sure he wants her to stop him. 

Fudge puts a paw on his knee, tries to nudge his way under Liam's hand. He knows too. Fudge always knows before anyone else does. 

"Liam?"

He blinks. Tamara's kneeling in front of him; he's wrapped in a blanket, and she looks worried. Fudge is on the couch beside him, his head in Liam's lap, ears pinned back sadly.  


_I dissociated._ "How long was I...?" 

She looks relieved to hear him speak. "Almost an hour," she says, stroking his forearm. "Why didn't you tell me, chicken?"

Liam's eyes well up. "I'm so sick of fucking thinking about it, Tamara." 

She looks like her heart's breaking for him. "You can be present without thinking about it, sweetheart," she murmurs, stroking his hair.

Liam's eyes overflow. "No," he croaks. "I can't. Don't you get that?"

She opens her mouth, then closes it and moves closer, drawing him into a hug. "I'm sorry about Brett," she says instead, quietly. "What do you need me to do for you?" 

_Bring Brett back. Oh, God, please just bring him back._

She's not Brett. She's not firm or tall or smooth like Brett, doesn't smell like him, doesn't sound like him. But she's warm and comforting, and she's safe, just like he is.

"This is good," he whispers back, burrowing into her embrace. "For now, this is good." 

~*~

He doesn't feel like being alone anymore.

His week of denial is rudely and abruptly over. It's settling in now - Brett's in a coma with no signs of waking up. Possibly getting worse, possibly getting better, his whole fate a big question mark. 

He ends up at Kira and Malia's place. He isn't really sure what else to do, because he doesn't want to go back to being questioned by Stiles and Scott. Plus, now that they've worked out that they're basically in love, they're probably fucking all the time, and Liam can't handle that. 

So he goes to Kira and Malia's, Fudge in tow because he hates leaving Fudge on his own. Kira answers the door.

Her face lights up. "Hi!" she says, and her smile is so friendly and warm Liam's whole body trembles warningly with sadness. "We haven't seen you since, um-"

"I know, I'm sorry," he says quickly, to spare her tripping over her own explanation. "I just uh - I've been sort of a mess and Stiles and Scott kidnapped me for a bit. They said you were there on the first day, though. I don't remember, but thanks."

"No problem." She looks genuinely pleased to see him. "Wanna come in? Hey, if you want, why don't you stay a few nights?"

God, that sounds nice. Kira and Malia might not know what to say, but at least they won't put their feet in their mouths saying the wrong things to cover for it like Stiles and Scott do. "That'd be great," he admits. 

He leaves Fudge there while he collects some stuff from their house. He thought the memories would be comforting, but they're not. They're just painful, not knowing if he'll get to make more of them. 

When he gets back, Kira's made him tea and even some dinner. He stammers over awkward thanks, but that's pretty much when Malia butts in and says, "She's wanted to mom you for days now and didn't know if you wanted that," and Liam smiles. It feels foreign and fragile on his face, but it's there.

"I'm down with being mommed. Good practice for you, right? Besides, I spent the last few days with Scott and Stiles."

Kira winces. "Their hearts are in the right place."

Malia frowns. "That doesn't mean anything when they're both emotionally constipated." 

Liam likes their dynamic. Kira's sweet and happy and generally a really gentle person, and Malia's blunter and sharper and tougher than her. It works well; they play off each other perfectly. Liam goes about eating his dinner and listens to them talk, appreciating that they aren't asking loads of questions. 

After dinner, they usually go for a walk. Liam joins them, sometimes running ahead with Fudge. He thinks a little bit about Brett, then tries not to. He feels sort of okay. Also sort of like he'll break at any given moment. But okay as he can be, all things considered. 

They get ready for bed when the sun goes down. Liam watches Malia kiss Kira softly, bending her neck down, her hands on Kira's belly. Liam's glad Kira's got Malia, even if Scott and Stiles end up wanting nothing to do with the baby.

Kira hugs him goodnight and heads to bed; Liam stands in the bathroom and brushes his teeth, looking forward to the prospect of dropping off to sleep. 

He spits, rinses, and then heads out into the hallway. Malia's out there, wearing pyjama pants and a tank top. 

"Hi," he says. 

"Do you wanna sleep with us?" Malia asks Liam softly.

He shakes his head. "I kick in my sleep," he mumbles. "I might hurt Kira or the baby. Thanks anyway, though."

"Liam, look, you don't... you don't have to be alone," she says awkwardly. He knows she feels as weird about expressing emotion as he does, and he appreciates the effort.

"Thanks. I know." He tries to smile; it feels fake, more like a grimace. "I really do kick a lot though. I'm better off on my own."

"Okay... but if you change your mind..."

"I know." He nods. "Thanks, Mal. Night."

"Night," she murmurs, looking worried as he retreats down the hallway.

He slips into bed. Fudge lies down next to him; Liam listens to Kira and Malia murmuring through the walls. It's comforting to hear them that close. 

Helpless to fight his eyes, he closes them and slips off to sleep.

~*~

_Ashburton's the coldest place on Earth in winter._

_He's trekking through the snow, although he can't really remember why. He's looking for something. Trying to find meds, maybe. Brett needs him, he knows that much._

_The pharmacy. That's where he's going._

_The wind buffets him until he finally enters, pushing the door open with what little strength the cold has spared him._

_He knows this part of the sequence intimately. He turns, and the Keeper's there, grabbing him, holding him down, grabbing at his belt. Liam's dreamed this over and over again, so often it's hardly a nightmare anymore and more a tiresome part of his brain's memory process he just has to put up with._

_He wriggles, fights the Keeper off, hears the groan of the zombie and listens to the chomp of decaying teeth in flesh. He's released. Deposited on the ground so he can scramble away._

_He turns._

_The Keeper's gone; Brett's there, clutching his neck where there's blood seeping between his fingers and the zombie has bitten him. He chokes, staring at Liam with an accusation in his eyes - you did this to me. You weren't there. You let me down._

_Liam lunges. "Brett!"_

~*~

"Brett!"

The door opens; Kira and Malia enter straight away. "Where's Brett?" Liam moans, choking back a sob. 

They look at each other. "Liam," Kira whispers. 

"I just - I had this really fucked-up dream that he got bit and - where is he?"

They stare at him helplessly. Liam shivers; he's drenched in a cold sweat. He looks around; he's in an unfamiliar bedroom, Fudge is whining unhappily, nosing at him, and Brett's nowhere to be found, no matter how many times he looks. 

He lies back on the bed, rolls onto his side. The bed dips as they join him, one on each side, and he feels their hands hovering uselessly.  


"I'm awake, aren't I?" Liam whispers into the darkness.

There's a pause. Liam could cut their helplessness with a butter knife; he can feel it, hanging around him like a wet blanket. They don't know what to do or say to make it better. They don't know that neither of those things exist; there's no making it better. 

"Fuck," Liam moans. He turns his face into the pillow, buries his fists into it to stop himself from cutting into his own palms. He's in so much pain he feels like he's drowning in it, can't catch his breath, like there's nothing for him to hold on to and no way back to shore. There's no kind-of about it; he wants to die. 

He can hear someone crying. After a moment, he realises it's him - he registers it like he's a thousand miles away, outside his own body, listening to the husk of his body making strange, wounded, dying noises of grief, noises that sound like they're being torn from the throat of a suffering animal. 

"Get - get him a blanket." Kira sounds like she's crying too. "Maybe some water."

"He's already got-"

"I don't want to move him. I don't want to move him. Please, Mal, he's shaking-" 

"Does he have a fever? He's soaked." 

"He doesn't have a fever, Mal." Liam feels fingers in his hair, then a hand sweeping down his back; he trembles violently. "He's in pain." 

The bed moves. Malia leaves and comes back; Kira tucks the blanket over him, as best she can when he's so awkwardly positioned. 

"I don't know what to do. We can't leave him like this. We can't leave him alone." 

"Then we won't." 

"Should we get someone?"

"No. Don't get anyone. He knows it's us."

"How do you know?"

"If he didn't, he'd be fighting us. Like we're trying to hurt him. It's part of - it's part of the PTSD."

"How do you know that?"

"Brett told me."

~*~

He comes to what must be hours later.

He's scared when he does. He knows he hasn't been sleeping. He knows the difference between dissociating and sleeping; when you sleep, you're aware, upon waking up, that time has passed. When he dissociates, it's like he's blinked and hours have passed and he's expected to pick up where he left off.

He moves, timidly. The person near him jumps. When he opens his eyes, he sees it's Kira; she's lying next to him, and his head is pillowed gently in the vicinity of her stomach. She's stroking his hair gently.

"Hi, Liam," she whispers uncertainly.

He curls closer to her, grateful for her warmth. Behind him, Malia shifts. She's spooning him, an arm thrown carelessly over his waist, her legs tangled with his. Her breath is hitting the back of his head; between the two of them, they have him safely ensconced in a cocoon of warmth.

"Is he okay?" Malia mumbles to Kira.

"I don't know. He moved, but-"

"I'm back." His voice is wrecked; he doesn't know how long he cried for, but his throat and head hurt and his voice is like sandpaper and nails. "I'm really sorry I did that to you guys."

"Don't apologise," Kira says softly, running her fingers through Liam's hair. "We're just glad you're okay now."

He nods. Fuck, he's tired. And embarrassed. "Sorry," he repeats. 

"Are you feeling a little better?" Kira asks hesitantly. 

He nods. "I'm just tired," he tries to explain. "Thanks for staying."

"You should get some more sleep," Malia says sleepily. "You were only out a few hours."

He doesn't have the heart to tell them that wherever he was during those few hours, it wasn't asleep. So he just nods. Neither of them make a move to get out of bed, so he doesn't either; he lies there with his eyes shut until Kira moves.

He opens his eyes. She's holding out a glass of water. He takes it, trying to muster up a smile, and drinks until it's all gone, because he knows that's what she wants and what Brett would want too. Kira, on the other hand, won't badger him into it like Brett would. 

"Do you want to sleep again?" she asks quietly.

He shakes his head. "How's your baby?"

"Kicking. Wanna feel it?"

He hesitates, but eventually he lets her guide his hand to the spot that her baby's kicking - hard, at least, from what Liam can tell. "Does that hurt?" he asks, surprised at the strength behind the action.

"No. It's not all that comfortable either though."

"Hmm." 

There's a long silence. Kira's playing with his hair still - she's moved on from stroking it to plaiting tiny sections of it, then letting it bounce back. "Liam?"

"Yeah. I'm still awake."

She swallows. "Do you... if it's a girl, can I still name it Lori?" 

His heart's heavy. He wants to cry again. But he's done enough of that for tonight, so he pushes the urge down and says, "Yeah. I'd like that."

_Brett would like that._

~*~

_"You gonna eat anything, buddy?"_

_He looks up at Brett, who's watching him carefully. The nurses brought Liam a plate with eggs on it, some tomatoes even, but he's just... not really feeling food right now._

_It's been two days since surgery, and the most he's downed is some soup Brett coaxed him into and a few crackers. He felt sick enough after that to not want to try food, but they don't have any liquid food that could be pumped straight into him, so Liam's facing yet another uphill battle of eating food for the sake of regaining weight._

_Liam picks at his food unenthusiastically. It's not that he feels sick; he doesn't, really. But he's distinctly not hungry, and he remembers the first week after getting stabbed - a constant cycle of eating because he had to, taking a codeine pill, and promptly getting sick. He knows he's on anti-emetics. But he really does not want anything to do with these eggs._

_Brett's hand strokes his back softly. "C'mon, buddy," he murmurs, a vague plea in his voice. "You have to eat something. You don't have to finish it. Just give it a shot."_

_Liam eats a forkful of eggs reluctantly. There are things that probably need to get done outside, people that need help, a dog that needs his attention, but he's fucking stuck here with his side aching as he draws breath and tubes poking in and out of places he didn't know tubes could go. He's feeling pretty miserable._

_The eggs taste like cement. He eats them anyway, because he doesn't feel like puking and he knows Brett will be happier if he does._

_When he's finished, Brett smiles happily, which makes the whole affair worth it. "Good job," he says, which makes Liam feel kind of like a little kid who's being praised for eating his vegetables without argument. "You know, I bet if they had jelly or chocolate pudding you'd devour that."_

_Liam smiles. "Probably." Before all this, he had one hell of a sweet tooth. Probably why he enjoys oatmeal so much._

_Brett takes the tray away from him. Liam watches the way his muscles shift beneath his t-shirt, how his tattoos change in the light. He stops staring when Brett comes back to him, holding a few different medical supplies._

_"Can I change your bandages?"_

_Liam nods, sliding down a little in bed, and pulls his t-shirt up around his chest. The movement tugs on his stitches, and he winces a little bit._

_The nurses have stopped trying to change his bandages. He's not reacting the way he was on the first day, but he still sort of shakes when anyone who isn't Brett comes anywhere near him. He didn't realise he's be this bad about human contact, but Brett's the only one who can really get close without Liam's flight or fight instinct being triggered._

_"Feeling okay?"_

_"They're okay."_

_"Pain?"_

_Liam sighs; he's sick of all the questions about his nausea and pain and general state of health, even though he knows they're trying to help him. "I dunno. It's not bad. Just when I stretch."_

_"Okay." Brett peels back the bandages. "I know you're sick of the questions."_

_"Wouldn't you be?"_

_"Oh yeah. Absolutely." Brett's peering at his stitches. "Looks okay," he murmurs. "Okay. You know the drill."_

_He does. Cleaning, antiseptic, antibiotic cream, damp bandage over the stitches, and done. He's freezing by the time Brett's finished._

_Brett smiles at him warmly. "You'll recover in no time," he says kindly._

_Liam believes him._

~*~

He feels a little calmer when he wakes.

His previous dream of Brett was so fucked up that his brain must've decided he needed something soothing; that was a good memory to have. Brett's always been tender with him when he's been sick or injured, even when they didn't know each other well, and Liam kind of took that for granted. He wishes he hadn't now. 

He's groggy and headachy and hungry when he awakens completely; he sits up, looking around dazedly. It's light out. He must've slept for ages.

When he goes downstairs, wearing his sweats and a t-shirt, he's greeted by Kira. She's standing there, looking at the stairs and seeming kind of worried - she must have heard him moving around up there.

"Morning," she says softly.

"Morning." Liam rubs his neck. "What time is it?"

"Almost nine. You slept a while." She's fidgeting as he drops into one of the barstools; Fudge is sitting at Kira's feet, but he shifts around to where Liam is and licks his toes. Liam grimaces at the sensation, but doesn't try and stop him.

"So, um..."

"It's okay," Liam says. Kira blinks.

"What?"

"You can ask me whatever you want to ask me," Liam replies. "I won't be offended or anything. I know it's hard to deal with and that you're probably not sure what to say. Thanks for taking care of me last night." 

She nods. "Anytime," she smiles. "But... are you okay now?"

"Is Brett still in a coma?"

She nods, her eyebrows creased with worry.

"Then no. I'm not. But, you know." He rubs his face. "Had my meltdown last night. Not due for another one until, oh, maybe dinnertime tonight." 

"You're joking about it?"

"It's the only way I know how to cope with it," he says miserably. "Trust me, I know there are better methods."

She shakes her head. "If that's what works, it's perfect," she says. "Besides, you've got plenty of time to learn other ways if you really want to." 

He watches her move around the kitchen. Brett said something similar to him when Liam had tried explaining to him that he didn't know how to cope in any way other than lashing out. He didn't realise, and he hasn't noticed it happening, but he seems to have traded outbursts for humour. Which he supposes is better. Slightly, anyway.

He rubs his face. "Can you tell me what's been going on?" he asks. "I haven't been paying attention."

"Sure. Um... well, the vaccines are working. They're pretty old school, but your blood is basically magic." She smiles at him. "Let's see... two of the bite victims survived with amputation. That's good. And the walls are getting patched up slowly. Oh, and." She smiles. "Guess what? Zack woke up."

Liam's head jerks up. "Zack woke up?" he breathes.

"Yeah. He's fine. Grateful to be alive. You should go see him."

"I will." _I got there in time. He'll be fine. The amputation worked._

It's nice to hear good news for once, but he sort of needs to know about the fatalities. Brett mentioned them, but didn't tell him how many were lost.  


"How many people did we lose?"

Kira looks down. "Almost thirty."

Jesus. That's a lot of people; Liam wasn't keeping up with the death toll when he was working on pushing the zombies back. "That's awful," he murmurs.

She nods, then puts the plate she was drying down. "We've been meaning to talk to you," she murmurs. "We... were gonna bring it up last night but you seemed like you were in a good place, and..."

He nods. "Yeah. What's up?"

"Well, um," she hedges, her voice high, "you know how the holes in the wall were made by people? Well, Malia, she uh... she went down there, pretty recently, and she um, she said... and I don't really know how she knows but I trust her-"

Liam nods; he does too.

"And she says she thinks Logan made them."

Liam goes cold all over. "Logan? How can she-" 

"I don't know how she knows. But she does. She said there's some sort of plan to take him out."

"Why the fuck would he put holes in the walls?" Liam welcomes the familiar burn of anger to his veins - it's a swift and welcome reprieve from the tired, exhausting lethargy induced by grief. "Why-"

"She thinks he might've done it to try and sway the council into thinking that someone else did it," Kira says softly. "Like the Keepers. Or even Oakridge, if they exist. He wants to have a feasible reason to go to war and conquer the land and look like the good guy."

"If Logan put those holes there and let the zombies in," Liam says quietly, "then he's the reason Brett was bitten." 

_And I'm going to make sure he pays for that._

~*~

With Kira's information, he's got his work cut out for him: get down to the walls, investigate the holes, and find Malia to get some more concrete answers - and get in on this plan to take the fucker out.

It feels good to have a purpose. He stops briefly by the hospital to give Brett a kiss on the forehead and tuck his blankets more securely around him, then heads off.

_Oakridge_ , he muses as he heads there with Fudge hot on his heels. _If Logan wants to attack Oakridge and it exists, we need to find a way to warn them._

_I need to find Oakridge_ , he realises. _Brett's friends... his family..._

They need to know. He knows that. He just can't imagine having to deliver the news.

He reaches the walls quickly, threading around the back so none of the cleanup crews spot him. He manages to find the first hole he and Malia identified as being man-made - and doesn't need to go any further than that.

There's blood on the metal, which is something he noticed before, but now he registers that Logan has a wound on his arm and Liam doesn't know of him working with the crews fighting back the zombies. So it can't be from that. 

There's also a scrap of material stuck in some of the torn up metal on the ground. These holes had to have taken forever to make; whoever did it chose this location to avoid being heard, most likely. Liam shudders as he leans down to inspect the cloth, thinking about how many zombies could've made it in had the tree not warned them.

He touches the cloth. Purple and blue flannel, rough material. Logan wears a shirt exactly like this - or at least, he used to, at least twice a week. Liam hasn't seen it in a while.

_That fucker_ , he thinks furiously. _He got everyone killed to start some stupid fucking war that isn't going to matter because there won't be anyone left to fight for._

_Why couldn't this have been enough?_

"Kira told you, huh?"

He turns. Malia's standing there.

"So what're we gonna do about it?" Liam asks, straightening up. 

"Well, I said we should kill him," she says matter-of-factly, "but everyone else disagreed with that idea."

"I think that's a great idea," Liam says with a shrug. 

She grins a little. "Sheriff Stilinski says we're going to handle it properly. That he can't know or he might make life hell for the residents. And we haven't figured out what to do with him anyway. But he can't know."

"Got it," he says. "He can't know. You're gonna keep me updated, right?"

"We're gonna need you the most," she confirms.

"Good," he mutters. "I kind of wanna use him for target practice right now."

They stand for a moment; Malia's watching him steadily, her brown eyes calculating. She's intense in a way the others aren't, Liam doesn't find it unnerving, but only because he knows she's coming from a place of concern. 

"You look like shit, Liam," she says eventually.

He gives a short laugh at that; Malia doesn't tiptoe around him and treat him like he's made of glass, which he really appreciates. "Thanks. Listen, um - I have a favour to ask."

"Okay," she says slowly.

He takes a moment. But he needs to do this - Brett wanted to find Oakridge. Liam has no emotional investment in the place, but Brett - Brett did, and he wants to find it. Wanted to find it. Liam's still confused by all the verb changes he's having to make in his head. 

And if Brett wanted to find Oakridge - if it was important to him - then it's important to Liam too. "I know the search for Oakridge got called off," he says quietly. "But I want to keep looking." 

She faces him properly. "Why?" she asks. "Is this about Brett?"

"It's always about Brett," Liam replies. He's not ashamed of that admission the way he might have been before; he loves Brett and his only regret is not getting to tell him before he went into the coma. "He wanted to find it," he continues. "Said his friends were going there, or that his family might be there. I promised him I'd find it when I first met him and I'm gonna keep it." 

"You know Logan's watching you, right?" Malia asks softly.

Liam feels a flare of anger, closely followed by a nearly overwhelming desire to hunt Logan down and put an arrow between his eyes, right where it fucking belongs. As far as he's concerned, Logan's a murderer. "I know," he says calmly. He'll get his chance. Not now. But soon, maybe.

"Liam," Malia says as he turns to leave. "Why Oakridge? Why now? You didn't care before."

"It's the only thing that still makes any sense," Liam replies. "You'd do it for Kira, right?"

He swears he sees Malia's eyes well with tears, then, an action so uncharacteristic he's surprised by it. "Will you help me?" he asks plaintively.

She takes a moment to swallow. "We'll all help you." 

~*~

On his way back from the walls, he stops by the hospital.

He's about to go into Brett's room, but he hesitates. He's been having trouble justifying the amount of time he's spending at Brett's side lately; he loves Brett, and he'd do anything for him. But he's fairly sure Brett wouldn't want him wasting away in a hospital room.

After a moment's hesitation, right outside Brett's door, he turns around and heads down the hallway. He knows where Zack's room is - he can look in, see if his mom's there, and leave if she is.

He peeks through the window. April isn't there, but Zack's dad is; he looks up when he hears footsteps, recognises Liam, and waves at him - gesturing at him to come in.

Liam swallows as he opens the door quietly, lets Fudge in ahead of him, and then slides inside, closing the door.

"Liam." Zack's dad - he doesn't even know the guy's name - stands up and offers Liam his hand. He's beaming. "Hey. Thank you. We didn't thank you before, but - thank you. April feels bad about what happened."

Liam nods, feeling a little nervous. "It's okay. I get it."

"I'm Brad, by the way," Zack's dad says quickly - he must have realised Liam doesn't know his name.

"Nice to meet you properly," Liam murmurs. He's suddenly aware that Fudge isn't next to him and looks past Brad to see Fudge, by the bed, craning his head to stick his nose into the covers. "Oh, c'mon, Fudge - sorry, he's usually good-"

"That's okay." 

Liam blinks; it's Zack who's spoken. He looks pretty pale and tired, but he's using his remaining hand to stroke Fudge's head, and he's smiling a little.

"Come and sit down," Brad says quickly.

_Oh, fuck. I don't wanna-_

Liam sits down uneasily. Zack looks at him curiously.

"What're you scared of?" he asks.

_Perceptive kid,_ Liam muses. "Hey," he says. "How're you feeling?"

"Sleepy," Zack yawns. "Thanks for helping me, Liam."

Liam's throat closes up abruptly. He nods and looks down at his knees; Zack doesn't seem to notice, still stroking Fudge's head, but Brad does. He puts a hand on Liam's shoulder and gives him a warm smile.

"We don't blame you, you know," he says. "You acted faster than anyone else would have... you saved our boy. We owe you. We'll probably never be able to repay you, but if you need anything..."

"Thanks," Liam says softly.

Fudge puts his paws up on the bed; Zack laughs, and he still sounds like a kid. Because he is a kid, Liam reminds himself. He watches as Zack uses his stump to rub behind Fudge's ear; he hardly seems bothered by it. It's only the hand that's missing. Liam wonders if it's still out near the trees, feels nauseated, and turns his attention elsewhere.

"Fudge likes you," he says to Zack. His dog - who is apparently a desperate attention whore - is snuffling at Zack enthusiastically, tilting his head to encourage Zack to rub just the right spot behind his ear.

"Did you name him?" Zack asks curiously.

"Yeah."

"Fudge is a good name."

Liam has to grin at that. "Thanks. Brett thinks it's shi - crap." 

Brad laughs. "It's fine. I swear around him all the time." He grows sombre as he looks at Liam, sideways, like he's forgotten how to talk. "How's Brett?"

_Does everyone know that Brett got bit?_ Liam wonders. _And do they all know I'm a fucking wreck? How'd anyone even find out we're togther?_

"He's... yeah," Liam murmurs. "He hasn't turned... Hasn't improved either. I'm gonna go see him after this."

Brad nods. "Do you want some company?" he asks kindly.

Liam's throat closes again, uncomfortably. He tries clearing it. "Yeah," he says. "Yeah, that'd be nice."

~*~

Kira has her baby five weeks early.

Spring. The flowers are already out of their bulbs by the time Kira's baby is born, sometime past three in the morning - crying weakly, fists bunched, her umbilical cord barely cut before Kira's haemorrhaging. 

Malia and the others are out on a scouting trip, meant to bring back medical supplies - they only left the day before, and they aren't due back for a week or more. Liam's the only one there, in the delivery room, when the nurses need to start working on Kira to save her life.

The baby's passed to him, still squalling, tiny and wrapped in a yellow blanket. Liam holds it close, instinctively, to try and keep it warm. Is five weeks too early? He doesn't know. He wishes he'd learned more from Brett, before. But still - the baby was meant to be safe and growing inside Kira's womb for another month, at least. It's not meant to be outside, not yet, not when there's still frost on the grass at morning and even Fudge shivers reluctantly as his paws hit the tiles in the kitchen.

He doesn't really know what to do with it. None of the nurses seem to remember he's even holding it. So he sits down, carefully, in the chair in the corner of the room, as the doctors work to save Kira's life, and he holds the baby, staring down at its tiny face, memorising its features. 

It's kind of early to tell, but Liam thinks it'll look like Kira, which is probably a good thing with Scott's wonky jaw. Little button nose. A thatch of dark black hair already. Liam remembers that you're supposed to check fingers and toes, so he does, carefully. As he peels back the blanket, he notices it's a girl.

His eyes well up, then overflow. "Lori," he whispers. He doesn't want to cry on her, so he tips his head up to the ceiling to get control of himself, then looks back down.

Ten fingers. Ten toes. Her hand, when he puts his fingers near her chest to feel her heartbeat, curls weakly around the tip of his index finger. He loses his breath, watching her, realising how small she is - how dependent on them she is to survive. Her heartbeat flutters against his fingertips, a hummingbird at dawn.

She didn't even get to sit on Kira's chest. Liam wonders about that - he'd never asked his mother about how he was born, or what it was like, but he assumes that right after he was delivered he was put on his mother's chest so she could hold him and feed him. He almost feels like that's where he still belongs - a child, ensconced in his mother's embrace, protected, at least momentarily, from the rest of the world.

But he hasn't had the luxury of having his mother for three years, and right now - with Kira being intubated and Malia's scouting party out of reach - he's all Lori's got. So he lifts her a little closer, awkwardly, and kisses her head, pulling the little blanket until it's under her chin - she's breathing kind of weakly, because she isn't meant to be here yet, but as long as she is, Liam's not giving up on her.

He's still sitting there with her when Mrs. McCall comes back, looking exhausted. "Liam," she says tiredly. "Hey."

"Is Kira okay?" he asks anxiously.

Mrs. McCall's face is solemn. "We'll see," she says. "Can you come with me?"

We'll see. Liam doesn't labour on it; right now, the most he can do for Kira is protect Lori. He follows Mrs. McCall down the hallway, into another room. Tamara's there too.

"Hi, Liam," she says kindly.

"Hi." He stands there with Lori cradled in his arms, feeling way out of his depth, but determined. "Am I holding her right?"

Mrs. McCall smiles a little. "You're doing a great job."

"Oh, good," Liam says, relieved.

"We need to feed her," Tamara says. "We pumped some of Kira's breast milk. Have you ever fed a baby?"

He thinks back to his aunt's baby - Fredrickson. "A few times."

"Would you like to?" 

He nods. They give him a bottle, but Lori can't get the plastic teat in her mouth; she's too small, and soon enough, she's crying.

It's Liam who thinks of using an eyedropper for the job, and it works - it's tedious work, but slowly and surely, he feeds Lori until she's sated and sleepy. Whenever his finger stays close for long enough, she grasps it, her eyes closed, her face content. Mrs. McCall shows him how to hold her to burp her, and Liam remembers that this is her granddaughter.

"Do you want to...?"

"Maybe later," she says kindly. "She seems happy with you."

Liam won't argue. He's happy with her, too - her soft, warm baby smell and her life, in his hands, the only place he's totally sure it's safe.

~*~

"Hi."

Liam sits down; he listens to the machines pump air into Brett's body. In his arms, Lori stirs softly, sighs, turns her face to nuzzle his chest.

"So," Liam says, "on all those medical TV shows, the docs always say coma patients can hear you when you talk to them. I dunno how true that is, but if they're right, you must be bored as hell. So. Hi." 

He pauses. Brett usually fills the gaps in their conversation. Liam feels helpless, staring down at his face, wishing Brett would wake up and hold him, put him back together the way he always has before. But Brett can't do that for him right now - it's Liam's turn.

"Kira had her baby," Liam says softly. "I was the first person to hold her. She's premature, though, she's... really small. We have to feed her with an eyedropper. Sometimes it sounds like she has trouble breathing, but... well, while she's breathing, I'm not giving up on her." 

He takes in Brett's face. It's familiar to him, but not; he knows every curve and plane, every line, could probably accurately draw the line where Brett's stubble grows in on his cheeks and jaw. He knows the laugh lines, his eyelashes, how soft his lips are. 

But right now, all those features - those things that Liam associates with Brett and safety and love - are marred by the tubes, the wires, the monitors. Brett hates repetitive noises; Liam hopes he can't hear, because the heart rate monitor is probably driving him fucking crazy if he can.

"Maybe I'll bring you earplugs," he says thoughtfully. 

Brett doesn't answer. Liam wants to touch his hand, but he's got Lori. 

"I'm not gonna lie," he admits quietly. "I haven't really been doing that well the last month. I'm the textbook definition of a fucking mess. It's why I haven't been to see you as much as I probably should have. But I'm feeling a little better now, you know? Lori needs me. The nurses are busy, and Kira's - well, I dunno, they used lots of long words, you would've known what they were - and Scott, Stiles and Malia just left for a scouting trip. I'm pretty much... I'm not gonna say I'm all she's got, but I'm pretty close, you know? I can't check out while she needs me."

He hesitates before saying the next part, but he needs to admit it out loud. For himself, if not for anyone else.

"I _really_ wanted to die," he says quietly. "It was nothing like what happened with Garrett. You know, I didn't really wanna live then either but I didn't see another option and I didn't actively think about dying, you know? This time, though... nobody would leave me alone the first week. And I mean I get it now. I was on suicide watch. I didn't know it but I was, even if they tell me otherwise. Probably smart. I wasn't thinking about how I could do it, but if I'd had the opportunity, then maybe..." 

_But I didn't get the opportunity, and now I don't feel that way, and there's Lori. Lori and Kira and Malia and Scott and Stiles and Tamara and, God, at least a dozen other people who'd probably be sad if I died..._

"Yeah," he finishes. "I'm not gonna now though. Even if... even if you..." His throat closes over briefly. "So if you can hear me, then... it's okay, if you're just, I dunno, holding on for the sake of it. Isn't that what people do? They just hang on until someone gives them permission? If that's what you're doing, and you wanna go... you've got your permission or whatever." 

Whatever happens next, Liam can at least know, somehow, that Brett didn't hang around in pain for months and months because Liam wouldn't let him go. And that's okay.  


"Hi, chicken."

Liam turns; Tamara gives him a gentle smile.

"Hi," he says.

"What're you doing in here?"

"Just came to see him." She seems surprised to see him put together for once, dry-eyed. "How's he doing?"

"He's fighting it," she says quietly, coming to sit next to him. "His body is starting to produce antibodies. The infection hasn't spread, at any rate." 

"That's good, right?"

"Yeah," she confirms reluctantly. "But Liam, I can't stress enough that this doesn't mean he'll make it."

"I know," Liam says quickly. "Just - it's good for now, right?"

She nods, offering him a small smile. "Yeah. It's good for now."

~*~

Kira is awake three days later - a month and three days since Brett went into the coma. 

She's weak, but she cries as she holds Lori for the first time - Liam's arms feel empty without the baby; he's hardly been without her since she was born. There are adults around, women, parents, who are far more capable than him. But Lori cries when she's given to someone else, and so the task falls to Liam. Not that he's begrudging or anything.  


"You were there," Kira says quietly. "Thank you."

"Where else would I have been?" He's sitting cross-legged on a chair next to her bed; he feels like he's little more than a kid himself. 

"Near Brett," she says, watching him.

Liam holds her gaze. "I can't help Brett right now," he murmurs.

There's a long pause.

"So. See anything scarring?"

Liam winces; the whole thing was bloody and chaotic and generally disgusting, and he's really glad he's not a woman. "I got closer to a vagina than I've ever been in my life," he mumbles, "and it really drove it home that I'm gay."

Kira giggles. "You know they don't usually look like that, right?"

"Don't care." Liam shudders. "At least you don't remember any of it. I do." 

Kira softens, looking at him. "Melissa said you fed her," she says. "With an eyedropper."

"Yup. That was me."

"Guess you finally had to change a nappy, then?"

Liam shudders again; Kira smiles. Then, "You kept her alive when I couldn't."

Liam feels distinctly uncomfortable at that. "If I hadn't, someone else would have."

"But you did it. Not someone else." Kira stares down at Lori's face, strokes her cheek a little. "Scott and Malia were supposed to be here. Even Stiles. I'm glad it was you."

Liam rubs the back of his neck. "I'm probably not a good choice of a parent," he says, feeling honest-to-God shaken with how Kira's talking like he's some sort of Messiah. "I mean, I've got lots of issues."

"Most people do." Kira's looking back up at him now. "You know, they told me you spent the whole night here swaddling her."

"Well, we don't have one of those hot crib things," Liam murmurs. "And... I dunno, she was supposed to be inside you for longer. Figured she'd probably be cold, right? Anyway, it was nice to hold her." 

There's a long silence. Liam stares at Lori, who blinks back at him sleepily. She's got blue eyes right now, but Liam wonders if they'll be brown later, maybe like Scott's, whose eyes look like tree bark in sunlight - or if they'll be more like Kira's, smooth and soft like melting chocolate. She doesn't really do much yet - Tamara said she won't for a while - but Liam still thinks she's kind of interesting in a way. She looks, and when he puts his finger close, she clutches it. His hand seems impossibly huge next to her fragile chest.

"She's cute," he says finally. "She looks like you. Even her jaw is symmetrical."

Kira giggles. "Thank God for small miracles, right? How come you didn't go on the scouting trip with them?"

_They need someone here to watch Logan. I didn't want to leave Brett. I didn't want to leave you. There's more to life than just surviving and we have to work out how to get there._

He doesn't say any of that; he just shrugs. "Didn't feel like it." Logan can't make him go; as far as he knows, Liam's still seventeen, still a minor by whatever bits and pieces of Before's laws they're following, and as long as Logan thinks he's seventeen, the others - mostly Mrs. McCall and Tamara - are able to protect him. Keep him here. If Logan knew he was an adult... he'd probably be halfway to Ashburton on a suicide mission.

Liam wonders if Logan knows they're plotting to get rid of him. Probably not; he's good at reading people, but Liam's been hiding from people his entire life. He's not about to slip up now. 

"Don't do anything dumb," Kira says quietly.

"Your mom instincts are at full-throttle, huh?"

"I'm serious," she says softly. "We need you, Liam. Me and Lori. Malia, and Scott, and even Stiles, especially when he won't admit it. And Brett. Brett needs you. So don't do anything dumb. Give it time, okay? Whatever it is you're planning... give it time."

"I will," he says, but even as he does, he's thinking, _but only because I have to._

~*~

Liam spends the next ten or twelve hours drifting between Kira's room, Brett's room, and their house. He takes Fudge for a run. Eats something, reluctantly, knowing he's dropped weight from his... well, his self-imposed coma of grief, really. He can't afford to get sick with Kira relying on him to care for Lori, and Brett relying on him to advocate for him.

He hopes their faith in him isn't misplaced. Although, he is slowly starting to think that maybe - and now that he's beginning to function again especially - that he is reliable. Dependable.

He's just heading back to the infirmary when he notices Mrs. McCall, Sheriff Stilinski and a few other people gathered in the intersection. He looks around; Logan's nowhere to be seen, so he approaches quietly. They look serious.

"What's going on?" he asks timidly, not sure he should be joining in.

Sheriff Stilinski turns to him with a strained smile. "Not sure you want to know, son."

_I asked, didn't I?_ "You all look pretty serious, that's all," he mumbles - and begins to try and fade out when he spots April in the crowd, watching him. He can't decipher the look on her face.

"He should know," Mrs. McCall says softly. "He's a scout."

He tilts his head. "Scouting stuff? Is it about Malia's team?"

"Not really," Mr. Yukimura replies. Even he looks serious, and Liam's never seen him look anything other than genial and composed, even when everyone else looks stressed.  


"It's food, Liam," Mrs. McCall murmurs to him. "We're running dangerously low."

"Well, what about the scouting teams?" he asks.

Sheriff Stilinski shakes his head. "They were pretty much decimated by the outbreak," he says. "The only functional team we had was Malia's, and we sent them out to find medical supplies. We've got some reserves of non-perishables, but-"

"We're almost totally out of meat," April finishes, speaking for the first time. Liam barely grazes her eyes in acknowledgment; Zack's out of his coma, sure, but he's fairly sure she still wants to destroy him. Even if she isn't acting like it. Even if he has gone and seen Zack twice, and it's clear Zack doesn't blame him at all for what happened.

"The wall scouts?" he asks. "They have experience, right?"

"Not enough. And a lot of people affected by the virus are still trying to recover," Mrs. McCall says.

"Me?" he asks.

They all look at each other; they have considered him, Liam realises, but they haven't asked before now. _Probably,_ he thinks guiltily, _because I've been completely off the rails crazy with grief._

"We didn't..."

"I get it," he interrupts. "But you can send me now. I'm okay." 

They all look at each other again.

"C'mon," he says. "I'm your only healthy scout and I'm volunteering. What more could you want?" 

"You're too young," Sheriff Stilinski says.

"I've been hunting on my own since I was fifteen," Liam replies heatedly. "I wasn't too young then and I'm not now." 

There's another long pause. Then, after a moment, April steps forward. "You'll need a driver."

Liam looks at her, startled. "Um-"

"I reacted badly when Zack was hurt," she says quietly. "That was wrong of me and I'm sorry. But we know you can't drive, at least not well. So... let me return the favour."

He darts a glance at Mrs. McCall; she nods encouragingly.

"Okay," he murmurs. "Let me get my things."

~*~

The drive out of River's End is nerve-wracking.

April's a good driver; she avoids most of the rocks and harsh terrain and seems to know all the back routes to the closest deer catchment. In the back of the car, Fudge pants happily - Liam thinks he's probably excited about the prospect of getting to run free in fields. 

"How old were you when it hit?" April asks softly.

Liam's startled by her voice; he jumps a bit. "Huh?"

"You said you've been hunting alone since you were fifteen," she says. "How old are you now?" 

"Seventeen." They're trying to keep up the impression that Liam's a minor; Logan has this weird thing about not letting him do some stuff until he's eighteen, which includes wielding a gun.

"And you were hunting that young?"

"No choice."

There's another long pause. Liam's fingers drum uneasily on his thigh; Fudge sits up with a whine and licks Liam's ear from the backseat. 

"I never actually thanked you," she says. "For saving his life."

"Don't mention it." He really doesn't want her to; he doesn't want to remember the blood and Zack's screaming and carrying him into the hospital. "Just did what I could." 

"And it saved him," she says. 

"You don't have to..." Liam rubs his face. "Look, I get why you lost it. I was a convenient target. I've been a convenient target all my life. You didn't permanently damage me or anything. It's fine. I get it." 

"Okay," she murmurs.

Liam sees a flash in the woods. "Stop the car," he says. "I send up the flare, get out of here, okay?" 

"Alright. Good luck."

With that, he's out of the car and whistling quietly to Fudge, who follows him. Liam heads to the edge of the wooded area - the grass is knee-high and only Fudge's tail is visible ahead of him. He's got his head down, sniffing frantically.

Liam takes a deep breath. This he can do. This is what he's good at. River's End is relying on him for food; he's gotta take down a deer quickly. 

The grass is crushed and parted where the deer have moved through it. That, at least, makes Liam's job fairly easy; he threads his way through the bigger tracks.

After a long winter and years of not seeing people or hearing industrial noise, the deer have forgotten that humans are dangerous to them. When Liam approaches the herd, soundlessly, he immediately picks his target - a female, standing at the edge of the herd, her flanks heaving with a recent sprint.

He raises his crossbow, waiting for the perfect opportunity. He can hit her from here. He's relieved that she doesn't seem to have a baby. He hates it when he has to kill the mothers.

There's a crack; she looks up, and Liam fires. The rest of the herd scatters, but he's hit her square in the head. She drops. Liam approaches her quietly and looks around.

The rest of the herd haven't gone far; the grass is an advantage, covering the whispers of his footsteps and Fudge's whole body. He can take down more of them. Bring April back, load up the car. 

He yanks the arrow from the doe's skull and keeps stalking. He picks off two more - a slow one, with a limp, that can't escape, and a large male. After that, hands shaking, he begins heading back.

April's edged closer. "No luck?" she asks despairingly.

He shakes his head. "Got three of 'em. Couldn't drag them all back." 

She doesn't say anything, clearly stunned, as Liam leads her, by foot, back to the spot. Now that his side is totally healed over and he's eating again, he's strong enough to haul the carcasses into the trailer, trying not to think about what he's done.

He steps back into the car and shuts the door. April stares at him.

"Told you," he says finally.

"You probably just saved everyone from starvation," she says.

He rubs his eyes shakily. "Yeah." 

She's glancing at him continuously as they start the drive back. "You don't like it, do you?" she asks slowly. "The killing. Some of the guys like it - they like getting their hands dirty. But you don't."

"No. Never have. Don't like blood." He shrugs. "I dunno. I know we need the deer to eat. But they didn't do anything to us, you know? It feels really fucking gross. I've never killed more than one at a time before, either."

She hesitates, but eventually, she says, "You did the right thing." 

"Thanks." It does help a little. 

They drive in silence for a while. Liam doesn't drum on his thigh anymore; April seems to notice he isn't as nervous anymore, because she says, "About Zack. Now that he's awake... when he's stronger, he wants you to train him." 

Liam turns to her. "Train him?"

"To defend himself. To use weapons."

"Logan won't like that."

"Logan won't know," April rebuts. 

"True." That Logan wouldn't like it only makes him want to do it more. "Okay. I'll do it."

She looks surprised. "Really?"

"Yeah. Most of the civilians in River's End are targets. This whole situation proves we need more people who are trained as scouts. We're fucked if something like this happens again. Uh... sorry. Screwed."

"No, I think fucked is the right word," she agrees. 

Liam even manages a smile. 

~*~

The next few days are a strange, messy blur. 

The frosts are melting quicker and quicker every morning. Liam's taken up running; it's nice to feel the cold air on the inside of his lungs, his body, burning with the effort of keeping him warm, the blood rushing through his veins. It reminds him he's alive.

"Liam!"

He stops; Savannah's waving at him from her front porch eagerly. He smiles as he heads over; she's wearing pyjamas and a dressing gown.

"Hi, Sav."

"Momma said to invite you in for breakfast."

"What's for breakfast?" he asks, leaning against the fence railing.

"I dunno."

He chuckles as he steps up. "Okay. Breakfast it is." He hasn't been running that long anyway. He follows her up the stairs, holds her hand when she takes his firmly - preventing his escape, probably. She's a ballsy kid, and Liam likes that.

"Morning, Liam," Amala says with a smile. "Good run?"

"Barely got started before Savannah ninja'd me from the porch," he says, and she giggles as she pushes him into a chair. "Oh, thanks. Where's James?"

"Just upstairs." Amala's got one of those smooth, lilting Indian accents Liam used to love hearing before; it seems naturally soothing to him, and he finds himself calm when she's around. "Are you doing anything today?"

He shrugs. "Not really. You need me to babysit?" 

"For a while, maybe, if that's alright?"

"Yeah, I'm happy to." Liam grunts when Savannah jumps onto his lap. "Looks like it's me, you and Fudge today, Sav." 

She spears a strip of meat onto her fork - with the weather warming up, the prey population is coming back, and that means less rationing of perishable resources. "Can we go see Brett?" she asks.

"Savannah," Amala admonishes, looking shocked. "I'm sorry, Liam, she-"

"It's okay," he says quickly. "You wanna go see Brett?"

"Yeah. I miss him."

"Okay. We'll go see Brett. He'd like that." 

"Liam," Amala murmurs. "You don't have to..."

He smiles awkwardly. "I know I've been sort of a mess lately, but I'm trying not to be anymore. Plus, if what all the fictional doctors on TV say is true, he can hear and he's probably really bored. And he likes kids." 

She finally smiles. "Alright. But, Savannah, you do what Liam tells you to, alright?"

"I will, Momma." 

"Good girl." 

He waits around at their house until Savannah gets dressed, then they leave for the infirmary. Savannah waves hello to everyone she sees; Liam wonders if she's bored, then, remembering that she's only six, realises that she probably doesn't remember a time when there were more people than this.

He stops outside Brett's room and crouches in front of her. "Brett looks a little different, okay?" he asks softly. "But don't be scared of him. He's still Brett."

"Okay." 

Savannah doesn't seem scared of the machines like everyone else is; she hops up on Liam's lap when he sits down in the chair and points to the ventilator. "What's that?"

"It's breathing for him." 

"What's that?" 

They play that game for a while; Liam tries to explain what all the equipment is, but truth be told, he's not all that sure himself. Eventually, Savannah starts naming the equipment herself. 

They leave when she yawns sleepily. Liam piggybacks her to her parents' house; when they get closer, she wriggles as if she wants to get down, then drags Liam to her cubby house. It's pretty sturdy, Liam thinks proudly. He doesn't fit in it, not really, but he kneels outside the tiny window.

"I really like it in here," Savannah says.

"Yeah? I'm glad."

"I'm gonna have a family one day."

That makes Liam sad; they avoided two disasters with the zombies in the walls and the disease, still lost almost thirty people, and he knows it won't be the last. Sometime, eventually, something is going to get them. 

Savannah seems to notice, because she gives him a sticky, sweet kiss on the cheek and says, "Cheer up, buddy." 

He can't help but smile at that; maybe she picked the word up from Brett before. "Okay." 

"Liam."

He stands up and turns; it's Logan. He doesn't look surprised to see Liam here; he walks closer to them, his hands in his pockets. Genial. Smiling. Liam hates the fucking bastard.  


Savannah exits her cubby, but she stands behind Liam. She doesn't like Logan either. Nobody does, so Liam can't blame her for that.

"I saw you brought in three deer the other day," Logan says - he must be referring to the solo hunting trip Liam made. "That's impressive."

"They're out now it's warmer," Liam says cautiously. 

"Three deer?" Logan smirks, coming a little closer. Liam holds his ground; Brett's been bitten and infected and he's in a coma. Liam's worst fear has already come to pass, and nothing else can scare him now. "Like I said, that's impressive. None of our scouts have managed that before. You must be an excellent shot."

"I'm okay." Liam's not giving him more than that; he knows Logan's filing away everything he says. If everyone knew he was like this before, there's no way they would've chosen him to lead; he's smart. He knows what people want to hear. Liam's not going to give him the opportunity to run his mouth.

"I was thinking about upgrading you," Logan continues. He waits, but when Liam doesn't answer, he keeps going. "To a bigger house. Closer to the town hall, maybe. Where the action is." 

_I like our house, you fucking prick._ "I'm fine where I am," he says quietly. "And when Brett wakes up, he won't be able to handle stairs." 

Logan's eyes flash. "About Brett..." 

"Hi, Liam."

It's James; he's striding towards them quickly, looking worried. "Thanks for looking after Savannah," he says, forcing a smile.

"No problem." Liam's still watching Logan. 

James looks too. "Logan," he says.

"James. How's Amala?"

"Good. We're enjoying the meat Liam brought back." James smiles at Liam gratefully. "It was getting pretty scarce for a while." 

Logan tilts his head. The atmosphere is tense. James hesitates before turning to Liam. "Do you want to stay for dinner?"

"Sure," Liam murmurs.  


Logan takes another step forward - Liam knows he's trying to bait him into doing something or saying something stupid, and the urge to fall for it is nearly overwhelming. He has to force himself to take a step back; Logan needs to think Liam feels threatened by him, even when Liam's only urge is to stand his ground.

"Brett's using a lot of medical resources, Liam," Logan says. "We can't keep it up forever." 

Liam's ears ring deafeningly, but James doesn't give him the opportunity to speak - he surprises Liam by stepping in front of him and saying, "How many healthy scouts do you have, Logan?"

Logan narrows his eyes warningly at James. "Four." 

"And how many are here?" 

"One."

"Right. One. Liam. I'm sure the amount of food Liam brings into the community every week could probably be considered a fair exchange for the medical resources Brett needs right now. In fact... considering the medical resources are only being used to keep one person alive, currently, and Liam's food is keeping the entire community stable, I think we get the better end of the deal." 

Liam looks at the side of James' face. Nobody's stuck up for him before - except Brett, and Owen and Vinnie before then. Everyone else has left him to fend for himself. Maybe that's why James sticking up for him feels so humbling. 

There's a long pause. Logan looks like he's just bitten into something rotten; he stares at Liam, and Liam lowers his eyes to the ground, silently, digging his newly-grown fingernails into the palms of his hands until he feels them pierce the skin. The pain is a relief, keeps him grounded. 

_You'll get your chance_ , he tells himself. _You're gonna get your chance. You won't have to deal with him much longer. Play smart, not hard._

"I hope Brett feels better," Logan says icily. "Think about that house, Liam. You are a real asset to the community, after all." With that, he's turning and striding away.

James waits until he's gone to turn to Liam. "We won't let anything happen to Brett," he murmurs, putting a hand on Liam's shoulder. "I promise. We'll have someone there, okay? Twenty four seven."

Liam knows he's about to cry again. Fuck, he's so sick of crying all the time. "Thank you," he says, his voice breaking. "Nobody's ever-"

James pulls him into a hug. "He's a good man," he says softly. "So are you. The community's behind you, Liam. No matter what happens." 

Liam nods against James's shoulder, then pulls away and wipes at his face self-consciously. A few tears have leaked out of his eyes; he makes sure they're gone before he looks back up. "Thank you," he says again, his voice a little wobbly. 

"Anytime." James smiles kindly at him. "So will you join us for dinner?" 

Liam nods, his throat tight. "I'm, um. I'm gonna go see Brett first. Is that okay?"

"Of course," James murmurs. "We'll wait." 

~*~

He runs to the infirmary.

The nurses don't even look surprised to see him anymore; they let him pass them, and the pressure in his chest - an impending panic attack - only lessens when he steps into Brett's hospital room.

The hiss of the ventilator is almost comforting; Logan hasn't switched him off. Liam sits down in the chair next to Brett's bed leans forward to grasp his hand. It's freezing cold.  


"Hey," he says. "Sorry, I'm back again. You're probably getting really fucking sick of me, huh?" 

He moves his hand. A smear of blood is on Brett's; that's when he remembers that he cut into his own palms. He opens his hands, wincing when he sees the coagulating blood in the lines on his palms, the crescent shapes he's left in his own skin.

"Shit," he says quietly, then gets up and washes his hands in the little bathroom. When he comes out again, Mrs. McCall is checking on Brett.

"Hi, Liam," she says.

"Hey." He sits. "How's he doing?"

"Pretty good, actually," she says with a smile. "A lot of stuff is normalising for him. That's a good sign at least." She looks at his hands. "What happened?"

"I.E.D," he murmurs. 

"Ah. Here." She produces a roll of bandages and puts a single layer over them. "There you go."

"Thanks." He hesitates, but... "Is someone at the hospital all the time?"

"Yeah." She eyes him closely. "Why?"

"No reason," he murmurs. But he knows they have to get rid of Logan soon - Brett's not going to be safe for much longer if they don't.

~*~

"You're so tiny," Liam mumbles, tickling Lori's belly with his fingertips.

There's a pause, and then she gives him a little smile. Liam knows it isn't a real smile - Kira said her "social smiles" wouldn't start until she was a month old or something, but Liam still grins back at her.

"That can't be comfortable," Kira says.

Liam's sitting cross-legged on the floor, pitched forward at his hips to lean on his elbows. It isn't, but he gets to see Lori properly from here, watch her eyes track him as he moves and see her tiny feet kick when he tickles her. Playing is gentle, because she's only a week old, but Liam's got it worked out.

"Do you think she gets bored?" Liam wonders aloud. "Like, just lying around all day?"

"No," Kira smiles. "Considering she's got you wrapped around her little finger."

Liam won't dispute that. He's pretty much in love with this kid already, and all she does is cry, poop, and vomit. With the occasional break to sleep. She's way cuter than his nephew was though.

"Scott and Malia and Stiles should be back soon," he says thoughtfully. "They won't even know."

Kira looks nervous. "Yeah."

"Hey, if Stiles says anything, just let me know, okay? I'll mess him up." 

That at least gets her to laugh. "Thanks, Liam."

"No problem." He wraps Lori's feet in his hands, grinning delightedly when she pushes against him. "She's so smart." 

Kira smiles. "Have you ever thought about being a dad, Liam?"

He shrugs. "Not really. Didn't before because I was too young, and now... I dunno. I 'm probably too screwed up. I'll just be Lori's surrogate big brother. The one that gives her everything she wants and never disciplines her for anything."

"You'd be a good dad," Kira says. "You aren't screwed up. And hey, I was thinking - we should probably socialise Fudge with her."

"He's a big dog," Liam says, staring up at Kira. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah, I'm sure. She's going to grow up around him; they have to know each other. We'll just be careful. Besides, he didn't hurt you after you'd had your surgery, and he's good with the other kids around here."

"Okay," Liam murmurs. "If you're sure."

They walk back to Liam and Brett's place - Liam holds Lori against his shoulder and marvels at her fierce warmth and her breathing and how soft and pure she smells. She's too young to really hold onto him, but he's looking forward to that. He likes feeling needed.

He passes Lori off to Kira so he can open the door; Fudge is sleeping on the couch, but lifts his head when they enter.

"Hey, boy," Liam says, smiling and rubbing Fudge's ears happily as Fudge sniffs him, then Kira, enthusiastically. "Got someone for you to meet."

He's not stupid; when Kira sits down on the couch, Liam holds Fudge's collar carefully, so that he doesn't lunge. For a moment, Fudge seems confused - he puts his paws up on the couch and sniffs the bundle of blankets that's Lori curiously. Then he sticks his nose inside. 

He's not making any sudden movements; Liam smiles as he huffs against Lori's skin, then withdraws his nose and gets up on the couch properly. He noses the blankets for a while, and Liam realises - somewhat belatedly - that he's trying to nudge them closer to her.

"Wow," Kira says.

"He must've been around babies before," Liam murmurs. "Good boy."

"I used to see videos all the time of dogs trying to cover babies with blankets," she says. "Something about a protective instinct if they're well socialised. He'll probably make a better babysitter than my dad."

Liam laughs.

Kira stays for a while, but Lori's due for a check up at the hospital. She leaves, and Liam settles back on the couch with Fudge. He hasn't slept in their bed for a whole month; he can't. It's too painful, even now.

Fudge settles with him, sighing softly. Liam stares at the sun, setting just outside the window. He can't believe it's been more than a month. Almost six weeks, in fact. It simultaneously feels like it's flown by and crawled. 

He wonders how much longer it'll take as he slips into an uneasy doze. He has strange dreams - of Lori, being taken by strange people, of his friends - both before and after - dying horribly, of Brett turning. He can't wake himself up.

"Liam!" 

Liam snaps awake, gasping, drenched in sweat, to someone shaking him. It takes him a moment to realise it's Kira, eyes wide in the darkness.

"Kira?" he asks, sitting up. "What-"

"You need to come to the hospital. It's Brett."

~*~

Brett's coma lasts a month, thirteen days, five hours, and a few minutes. Not that Liam's counting.

He runs to the infirmary on Kira's instruction, and by the time he gets there, having sprinted the whole way, Tamara, Mrs. McCall, Dr. Deaton and another nurse - who Liam doesn't know - are at Brett's bedside. 

"What's going on?" he pants when he gets there. "What's-"

"His body produced antibodies," Tamara says. Her face is dripping with tears. "The virus is gone. Liam, we need to take the tube out of his throat. Come here, chicken, hold his hand. Talk to him." 

Liam approaches, terrified into silence, and takes Brett's hand. He's aware, suddenly, that Brett's chest is jerking, that he sounds like he's choking - but his cheeks are red with exertion and his eyes are open, eyelashes wet. They roll towards Liam, terrified, when Liam takes his hand.

"It's okay," Liam says immediately, even though he's not actually so sure about that. "It's okay, Brett." 

Brett relaxes a little.

"Tell him we're taking the tube out and that we need him to exhale," Tamara says.

"They're gonna get the tube out of your throat," Liam relays. "They need you to breathe out." The only thing sticking in his head is that Brett's clearly not a zombie. He's awake. Alive. 

Brett breathes out, and Mrs. McCall pulls the tube out of Brett's throat. Brett gasps in a few breaths, then promptly vomits - weakly, and just bile - over his own chest. 

"Shit," Tamara says. "Melissa-"

"I'll clean him up," Liam hurries to say. "You guys just - do your doctor stuff." He can't take Brett's blood or heart rate or remove needles or administer medication. But he can clean him up and calm him down. 

Liam's gentle as he moves. Brett's shaking like he's going to die from it and his skin is freezing cold to the touch; Liam uses a wet cloth to clean his chin and chest. Brett trembles underneath him, helplessly. 

"I think he's cold," he says, but no one listens to him. They're all arguing over something to do with blood and antibodies. So Liam stands up, strips out of his hoodie, and puts it over Brett's torso, making sure to tuck it around his shoulders and biceps. 

"I'll bring you another blanket," he promises. Brett still seems kind of like he's freaking out or half-conscious because he's not speaking and he hardly focusses on Liam for more than a second before his eyes slide shut. Still, his hand fumbles for Liam's. It's the bitten one; Brett's fingers are clumsy.

"Liam," he mumbles.

"I'm right here." Liam's voice breaks; he wipes his eyes. 

Brett nods a little, and then he's out. Liam's throat closes over; he lets everyone get back to their work and stumbles out into the hallway, sits down, and starts to cry. Not a few little tears, either; he sobs until he feels like his chest is caving in and his head's aching fit to burst.

Kira finds him like that and sits with him, her arms around him, soothing him until he stops. She's fiercely warm; she pulls Liam so he's resting his head on her chest, and he listens to her heart beat under her ribs.

Eventually, he slows, then stops. He sits a little - his eyes are puffy and his head hurts. Kira wipes his eyes with a soft smile.

"You're getting lots of practice for being a mom," Liam croaks, and she almost laughs. 

"How's Brett?"

"Alive." The word tastes sweet, like forbidden fruit, in his mouth. "He's alive."

~*~

The next few hours are long and tense.

Brett's still swimming in drugs - his blood has more sedative in it than actual blood - and he's disoriented.

Liam leaves the hospital, briefly. He gets his glasses, a book, an extra blanket - and Fudge. When he returns, Brett's adamantly refusing to cooperate with the nurse's requests. Tamara dismisses her and lets Liam in to see Brett on his own, telling him to call her if he needs anything.

He doesn't. Brett's alive. Liam could live off that knowledge indefinitely.

Once they're alone, Liam shakes the blanket out and tucks it around Brett, relieved when his shivering eases. He coaxes Fudge up onto the bed too, noticing that Brett's only got a single IV running into the back of his hand. 

"Liam," Brett mumbles.

"Hi," Liam says.

Brett licks his lips. "I'm thirsty," he croaks, barely opening his eyes.

Liam gets him some water. Brett drinks, slowly, seeming exhausted by the action, before leaning back in the bed and opening his eyes properly. "Sorry," he mumbles.

"For what?" Liam asks, bemused.

"Throwing up."

Liam shrugs. "No big deal. You threw up on yourself, not me." 

A faint smile twists the corner of Brett's lips. Liam smiles. "Warm enough?"

"Am now."

"Good." 

"You brought your dog." Brett's hand strokes Fudge's head; his hand is shaking violently. 

"I brought our dog," Liam replies. "He missed you." 

He waits for a reply. None is forthcoming; Brett's asleep again. Tamara did tell him Brett would be in and out of consciousness for a few days - that he's got a long recovery ahead. But Liam can work with recovery. After all, Brett's never left him.

He sighs, settling down on the edge of the bed and staring at Brett's face. His eyelids grow heavy. He knots his fingers around Brett's, traces the teeth marks in the heel of his hand.

"Sleep well," he murmurs, and then he drifts off.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There you go guys, I fixed it. ^_^


	24. Chapter Twenty Four - Relictis Vicis

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you guys for the amazing response on the last chapter! You're all amazing <3
> 
> This is about 18.5k of recovery. I'm not even fucking with you guys. Nothing untoward happens to anyone. Enjoy!

**Chapter Twenty Four - Relictis Vicis**

“Hi.”

_Liam. You’re here._

“So. On all those medical TV shows, the docs always say coma patients can hear you when you talk to them. I dunno how true that is, but if they’re right, you must be bored as hell. So. Hi.”

_You don’t need to be nervous and ramble, Li. It’s just me. I’m still me._

“Kira had her baby.”

_What? It’s too soon. How long have I been out?_

“I was the first person to hold her. She’s premature, though, she’s… really small.”

_That makes sense. Is she okay? Did you name her Lori? I hope you still named her Lori, Liam. That’s still a great idea._

“We have to feed her with an eyedropper.”

_I bet that was your idea. You’re good at taking care of helpless animals. I bet you’re good with a baby too._

“Sometimes she has trouble breathing.”

_She wasn’t supposed to be born right now, Li. You gotta keep her warm, okay? Wrap her up and hold her close._

“But… well, while she’s breathing, I’m not giving up on her.”

_Don’t give up on me either, Liam. I’m still here. Don’t give up on me._

Silence. The machine breathes for him. His chest pumps. No pain. He begs Liam to keep talking… to say something. Anything. His voice is a tether. A lifeline.

“I’m not gonna lie.” Liam’s voice sounds strange. “I haven’t really been doing that well the last month. I’m the textbook definition of a fucking mess.”

_What? What? What’s wrong with you? Are you okay? Do you need help? Ask for help, baby. Just ask for help. People will-_

“It’s why I haven’t been to see you as much as I probably should have.”

_Worry about yourself, baby. Take care of yourself. You first, me second._

“But I’m feeling better now, you know? Lori needs me. The nurses are busy, and Kira’s - well, I dunno, they used lots of long words, you would’ve known what they were - and Scott, Stiles and Malia just left for a scouting trip.”

_They left you alone, fuck, they left you alone and they shouldn’t have, I begged them to watch you if something happened to me, I told them-_

“I’m pretty much… well, I’m not gonna say I’m all she’s got, but I’m pretty close, you know? I can’t check out while she needs me.”

_I need you too, Liam. Don’t check out on me either. Please._

“I really wanted to die.”

_No, no, no no no no-_

“It was nothing like happened with Garrett. You know, I didn’t really wanna live then either but I didn’t see another option and I didn’t actively think about dying, you know?”

_Someone help him. Why isn’t anyone helping him?_

“This time, though… nobody would leave me alone the first week. And I mean I get it now. I was on suicide watch. I didn’t know it but I was, even if they tell me otherwise. Probably smart. I wasn’t thinking about how I could do it, but if I’d had the opportunity, then maybe…”

_No, baby. You can’t. You’re too young. You’re too young to want to die just because of me. You need to live. Just because it’s over for me doesn’t mean it has to be over for you._

“Yeah.”

_Hey, Liam, I’ll make you a deal, okay?_

“I’m not gonna now though. Even if… even if you…”

_You don’t give up on me, yeah?_

“So if you can hear me, then… it’s okay, if you’re just, I dunno, holding on for the sake of it. Isn’t that what people do?”

_And I won’t give up on you._

“They just hang on until someone gives them permission.”

_Deal?_

“If that’s what you’re doing, and you wanna go… you’ve got your permission or whatever.”

_Deal._

~*~

Something’s different.

He’s aware of lights. There are people talking, loudly, over his head. And there’s a tube in his throat - a machine, forcing air into his lungs, and his lungs are rebelling, trying to expand at their own pace.

He’s hit with a sudden, crushing wave of fear; he wants to scream but he can’t, and he feels tears run down the sides of his face. Tears. Coma patients don’t cry.

“Somebody get Liam!”

_Liam. I’m gonna see Liam. Liam’s gonna get here and it’ll be fine._

_Liam’s still alive._

He tries his best to cooperate with whatever everyone is doing, but he’s being pulled in twenty directions all at once and he’s confused and sluggish and scared. He desperately wants to rest, or wishes they’d focus on one thing at once.

The door slams. “What’s going on?”

_Liam. Liam’s here_. He’d recognise that voice anywhere - and Liam’s commanding attention to himself, demanding that someone answer his question. “What’s-”

_Liam’s here, and it’s gonna be fine._

“His body produced antibodies.” Tamara? “The virus is gone.”

_The virus is gone. I’m not dying. I’m waking up._

“Liam, we need to take the tube out of his throat. Come here, chicken.” Definitely Tamara. “Hold his hand. Talk to him.”

_Talk to me, Liam. Please talk to me. Please._

Liam’s hand wraps around his - and Liam’s warm, like a fucking fire, like laundry fresh out of the dryer and summer nights and every content morning spent lazing in bed when it was bitterly cold outside.

He opens his eyes, searches for Liam frantically - and finds him, so close, deliciously within reach, his eyes wide and endlessly, endlessly blue, just like Brett remembers them.

“It’s okay,” Liam breathes to him - the words are spoken softly, only for Brett, and Brett hears them, drinks them up like they’re all he needs to quench his thirst. “It’s okay, Brett.” His name on Liam’s lips sounds like home. He relaxes, hearing Tamara say something. Liam’s head turns to look at her - his hair curls over the collar of his shirt and glimmers in the light like gold.

“They’re gonna get the tube out of your throat,” Liam tells him softly. “They need you to breathe out.”

_You’re so calm. I’m so proud of you. I’m so fucking proud of you, Liam._

He breathes out, takes a few greedy breaths - his stomach lurches, and he’s puking, but hardly anything comes up.

“Shit,” Tamara curses. “Melissa-”

“I’ll clean him up,” Liam says immediately. “You guys just - do your doctor stuff.” Even as he says it, he’s reaching for a wet towel near Brett’s head and coming back with it, leaning over. His shirt falls open a little, and Brett catches sight of the creamy skin at the base of Liam’s throat, at the start of his chest, soft and smooth and silky. Untouched.

Liam’s so gentle Brett barely feels him move. He’s mesmerised by Liam’s movements, his presence, his scent - he pays little attention to the helpless trembles that overtake his body and leave him shivering violently.

Liam’s done with the towel, rakes his eyes over Brett, then looks around. “I think he’s cold,” he says.

Nobody seems to listen, judging by the slightly put out expression on Liam’s face. He stands up, then, unzips his hoodie, and drapes it gently over Brett’s chest and shoulders, tucking it around him. That’s when his attention turns to Brett properly.

“I’ll bring you another blanket,” he says softly, tilting his head as he watches Brett. Brett wants to talk, to tell Liam he heard everything, but he’s exhausted and he can barely keep his eyes open.

He gets his hand moving, across the mattress. Bitten hand. His fingers move sluggishly, clumsily. Something about his hand doesn’t feel right, and suddenly, he doesn’t want to touch Liam with that hand - his bitten hand, his wrong hand.

But Liam’s fingers grasp his again. He’s got calluses. His nails have grown out a little.

“Liam,” Brett murmurs tiredly.

Liam’s eyes glitter. “I’m right here.” His voice snaps chaotically.

_I’m right here_. Brett feels his eyes close.

_Liam’s here. I’m going to live._

~*~

“Brett?”

He blinks.

Liam’s hovering above him, looking curious and a little scared. “Hi,” he says hesitantly. “Are you awake?”

Brett nods drowsily. He’s probably not gonna be awake for long, what with how muddled up he feels, but his confirmation has a smile blooming on Liam’s face. Liam looks like he’s pretty at ease, and that helps Brett relax back into the bed.

“You want some water?” Liam asks.

“Um.” Brett wants to get his voice working again, even if it is low and scratchy with disuse. “Yeah. Please.”

Liam smiles wider - Brett takes a moment to think that Liam’s a huge dork if the prospect of Brett drinking is that exciting - and leaves his field of vision. When he comes back, he’s got a cup with a straw in it.

Brett drinks it down eagerly - he feels completely parched, wonders how long he’s been asleep. He looks up at Liam, thinking about asking when he’s done drinking.

He pauses. Liam looks different. He’s wearing short sleeves, which is the first thing Brett notices - the second is that Liam’s hair is much longer than it was when he was put into the coma. In fact, it’s probably almost long enough that he could tuck it behind his ear, at least in the front.

He lets go of the straw. “Liam, how long have I been out?” he rasps, feeling a little panicky.

Liam puts the cup down. “I’m only telling you if you promise not to flip,” he says.

“I won’t. I just need to know.”

“About six weeks,” Liam says quietly.

Brett’s head reels, struggling to take that in. Six weeks. He was out for six weeks. Liam was without him for six weeks.

“Liam,” he mumbles. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, I-”

Liam leans his elbows on the bed, getting close. “Why’re you apologising?” he whispers back. “It wasn’t your fault. Besides, you’re awake now. That’s good.”

“You needed me-”

“Well.” Liam gives him a small smile. “I won’t argue with you there. But I’ve always needed you. Shit happens, you know?”

“Were you okay?” Brett breathes. He feels sleepy again, but he doesn’t want to close his eyes.

Liam’s eyes flash. He pauses before answering, and that’s how Brett knows he’s trying to work out a way to avoid the issue entirely. Liam’s never been very good at lying to him, though, and he must know that, because eventually, he lets out a long sigh and says softly, “Not for a while. But towards the end, I was coping. Actually coping, not, you know, breaking down every five minutes.”

Brett nods weakly.

“Hey, go back to sleep,” Liam says. “You probably need it. Are you warm enough?”

“Yeah.”

“Good. Okay.” Liam yawns too. “Seriously. Once you go to sleep I can go to sleep.”

“You shouldn’t sleep curled up in a chair,” Brett mumbles. “It’s bad for your back.”

“Like I’m gonna live long enough to worry about back problems,” Liam says, but he’s smiling. “I’m not leaving.”

“You don’t have to,” Brett says, tugging on Liam’s hand - he didn’t even realise he was holding it until now. “Come up here.”

“On the bed?”

“Yeah.”

“It’s a pretty small bed.”

Brett cracks an eye open. “You’re a pretty small person.”

Liam gives him a flat expression, but his lips are twitching as he moves round to Brett’s right side - his left hand has an IV in the back of it - and lowering the railing. Brett hadn’t even realised it was up.

“Not an invalid,” he mumbles.

“I know.” Liam’s taking his shoes off. “Just making sure you don’t roll out of bed and crack your head open or something.”

“I wouldn’t.”

“Yeah, yeah.” The bed moves as Liam climbs up onto it, carefully. “Fuck, this thing is really rickety. What a piece of shit.”

Brett smiles sleepily. While it’s really nice that Liam’s been so sweet and attentive lately, it’s also nice to hear him cussing up a storm over an unstable bed. That’s his Liam.

Liam settles in behind him, sighing contentedly. His weight, where it presses against Brett, is deliciously heavy and warm, like a furnace. Maybe he was a little cold. He’s definitely not got any objections about the way Liam curls up on him - a leg over his waist and his chest level with Brett’s head. From here, he can almost hear Liam’s heartbeat.

“Come closer,” he says.

Liam shuffles closer, and Brett tilts his head so his ear is on Liam’s chest. He’s expecting a quip about how mushy he’s being, but it doesn’t come; Liam just plants a kiss on his head and relaxes into the bed, letting Brett use him as a pillow.

_Best pillow ever_ , is Brett’s last thought before he drifts off into sleep.

~*~

He wakes up to the door clicking open.

Liam’s already awake, lifting his head up, and pitching his torso protectively over Brett’s head. He relaxes after a moment, and Brett hears Kira’s voice.

“Hi, Liam.”

“Hey.” Liam’s smiling. “You brought Lori!” he says delightedly.

Brett rolls over. Kira’s sitting down carefully in the chair next to Brett’s bed, holding a tiny pink bundle.

“Hi, Brett,” Kira says. She’s glowing. “Are you feeling better? We were gonna come in to see you sooner but Tamara said you were pretty out of it, so we decided to wait, and - well, um, this is Lori.”

Brett vaguely remembers knowing that Lori was born when he was out. He sits up a little, just to peer into the bundle, and Kira’s baby stares back at him - blue eyes, though they are dark blue, like they might already be turning brown, and a shock of straight black hair.

“She’s beautiful,” he whispers, smiling. “Hi, Lori.”

“Do you wanna hold her?”

“Oh God, yes please.” He sits up properly so he can, and Kira deposits Lori in his arms. She looks at him, seeming a little bemused to be held by a stranger.

“Lori,” he murmurs. “You named her after my sister.”

Kira smiles a little. “I was unconscious,” she says. “Liam named her.”

He looks at Liam, but Liam’s not watching him. He’s got eyes only for Lori, and sticks his face close to her with a loving, gentle smile. Lori touches his cheeks and jaw curiously.

“I’m pretty sure Liam likes Lori more than me,” Brett murmurs.

“Do you blame me? Look at her,” Liam coos.

“Liam, everyone in here is going to melt into a puddle of feelings if you keep being so cute with that baby,” Brett says with a smile.

“I don’t care. Melt all you want.” He looks up at Lori. “Can I play with her? On the floor?”

“Sure,” Kira says with a smile. “By the way, Malia took Fudge for a two mile run today. He’s exhausted.”

“Sounds about right. Lazy pri - uh…”

Kira laughs as Liam slinks off to the floor with Lori and a blanket. “He’s trying not to swear as much when he’s around her,” Kira explains. “Thinks it’ll corrupt her.”

“He’s probably right,” Brett says. He’s almost surprised by how completely taken Liam is with Lori. He watches as Liam bends over her - she’s lying on a blanket on the floor - and smiles widely before tickling her stomach. Lori kicks and makes a happy gurgling noise.

“He’s totally in love with her,” Kira whispers to Brett, smiling. “He even changes her nappy.”

“What? Really?”

“Yeah. Reluctantly.”

Brett smiles, watching Liam’s hands enclose Lori’s tiny feet. “How about Scott and Stiles?” he asks.

“Oh, well… Scott’s been good, I guess,” Kira says. “He likes babies and kids. Stiles isn’t really… I don’t think he dislikes her, he’s just not very sure of what to do with her. He almost fainted when I asked if he wanted to hold her.”

“And Liam?”

Liam makes a quiet cooing noise at Lori before nuzzling her belly with his nose. Brett’s pretty sure his heart just melted down into a pile of goop inside his chest.

“Liam was there,” Kira says. “When she was born. Something went wrong and I lost a lot of blood - they had to intubate me for a while.” She shakes her head quietly. “I owe Liam her life,” she murmurs. “And mine.”

“What do you mean?”

“The nurses were really busy - what’s left of them anyway - and everyone else had gone on a run. Right after she was born, that first night - Mrs. McCall told me he spent the night pacing up and down the hallway, swaddling her and keeping her warm and feeding her every few hours. Without him… well, she wouldn’t have been alone but she wouldn’t have been as safe, you know what I mean? He looked after her for the whole three days almost. Only took breaks to sleep.”

Brett nods, watching Liam. “How come he didn’t go on the run?” he asks softly.

Kira looks up at him, her expression stricken. “He… Brett, they couldn’t take him out,” she murmurs. “Not… not with the way he was, he… he would’ve gotten killed out there.”

“How bad was he?” Brett asks, and when Kira balks, pleads, “Kira, I need to know. I’m going home with him and I need to know how he is.”

“He’s fine now,” she whispers - Liam’s not paying them any mind. “It was just… look, Brett, he was bad. But it’s not my place to tell you. He will. He’s really okay now. He was pulling himself back together. Especially once Lori was born, and when people were hungry - he pulled through. For everyone.”

Brett looks at Liam. He doesn’t look like he’s suffering right now. He really does seem okay; maybe Kira’s right. Maybe it’s all fine.

He lets out a breath. “Okay,” he murmurs.

“You should be proud of him,” Kira says with a smile. “He really… he picked himself up, you know? He could’ve just laid down and given up but he didn’t. And he never gave up on you either.”

_Liam, I’ll make you a deal, okay? You don’t give up on me, yeah? And I won’t give up on you. Deal?_

“I know.”

~*~

Brett wakes up to Liam lying comfortably behind him.

Liam’s arm is slung over his chest, his smaller body spooning Brett’s pretty effectively, face tucked down near his shoulder. He’s fast asleep.

Brett smiles drowsily. Liam’s sweet. He’s been unendingly patient with Brett the last few days - helping him get clean and changed and, for the first day, helping him eat and drink. He just hopes Liam’s eating and resting enough himself.

He wouldn’t bank on it, having said that. There are deep, exhausted bags under Liam’s eyes, and he looks washed-out and pale in the dim light. He’s also shivering a little; Brett rolls a little bit, carefully, and tugs the blanket up over him.

Liam mumbles something and shifts a little, eyes still shut. Brett lets his eyes skim Liam’s face slowly, taking in the soft curve of his mouth and the half-moon shadows his eyelashes make on his cheeks, and his eyebrows, which are still impeccable, and his hair - which seems blonder, now that it’s grown out a little.

Brett’s not sure he’s ever seen it quite this long. He reaches up - with his bitten hand - and curls a lock of it gently around his fingertips, smiling as it twists through his grip like spun silk. It flows through them easily; Brett watches as the strands slip seamlessly over the bite. He feels nothing. Not even the slightest tickle. The flesh is paler there too.

Liam’s hand catches his, and Brett looks down at his face; Liam meets his eyes as he kisses the bite. Brett still feels nothing, even as he watches it happen.

“When did you wake up?” Liam asks softly.

“Five minutes ago.” He watches as Liam closes his eyes. “You look wrecked.”

“Mm.”

“You should go back to sleep,” Brett says.

Liam’s thumb trails across the bite again. “Can you feel this?”

“No,” Brett replies quietly. “Not within an inch of the teeth marks, anyway. I can feel my fingers.” He pays attention to Liam’s neck thumb stroke. “There,” he says.

“There where?” Liam asks confusedly.

“That’s where the sensation stops.”

Liam tilts his head, as if he’s considering. Something about him has changed since Brett’s been out - he’s never seen Liam this collected or calm. He’s not sure what happened, but he’s grateful for it, because he barely has the strength to eat and drink on his own, let alone ensure Liam’s alright. Not being able to take care of himself is fine; not being able to take care of Liam makes him feel weak.

“It’s not the worst place you could lose sensation in,” Liam says finally.

Brett smiles. Liam grins back at him, impishly, and settles closer to him with a shiver.

“You fucked me in this hospital,” he says.

Brett finally laughs, even though it’s unwilling and he doesn’t really want to. Damn Liam and his relatively cheery disposition. “I did.”

“Do it again sometime?” Liam asks hopefully.

“Sure.” Brett mellows again. “If it even still works.”

Liam’s hand trails questioningly under the covers, inching towards his thigh - slow, his eyes on Brett’s face. That’s when Brett realises that somehow, during the time he was out, Liam’s learned to read people the same way Brett reads him.

He lets Liam’s hand continue - and, to his relief, his dick twitches with interest. Liam grins triumphantly.

“It works,” he says.

“Maybe we can test it properly when I’m home,” Brett says with a small smile. “Whenever that is.”

Liam shrugs like he doesn’t care, at all, when that might be. “You’re alive. I’ll settle with that for now.”

It’s not like Brett can really walk, even. He’s been awake about a week, and he’s slowly regaining some strength - but being in a coma for almost six weeks has left his muscles feeble, and even his mind feels slower. He doesn’t think he was fully conscious until the third day - his first real memory of being awake was Liam, shaking out another blanket and spreading it over him, tucking him in, and then sitting back down in the chair next to his bed. He doubts Liam’s left him for very long. He’s been sleeping a lot, but still - Liam’s always there when he passes out and always there when he wakes up. He’s either timing it incredibly, or he never leaves.

Not that he has a reason to. Fudge has been here since pretty much the first day Brett was awake, apparently, and the nurses haven’t tried to tell either of them that the dog needs to go. Brett’s grateful; the infirmary is cold a lot of the time, and when Liam can’t sit with him and just needs to get up and move around - because Liam’s fidgety and can hardly sit still - Fudge is more than willing to snuggle up to Brett on the bed and keep him warm.

He rolls a little bit, moves his arm, and lifts it up, looking at Liam questioningly. Liam smiles as he lifts his head and lets Brett slot his arm underneath his neck, gets close and snuggles up to him. His hair isn’t even remotely spiky anymore.

“You really need a haircut,” Brett says, brushing it out of Liam’s face.

Liam looks up at him, smiles tremulously - and then there are tears rolling down his cheeks, and he’s tucking his face away, where Brett can’t see it. Brett doesn’t ask why he’s crying; he’s pretty sure he knows. He’s pretty sure he did the same thing when it became clear, after Liam was stabbed and got the infection, that Liam was slowly wading through the fever swamp of his own mind and coming back to him. He knows relief. It’s almost as powerful as grief is.

“It doesn’t look _that_ bad,” he says, smiling, and Liam hiccups over a wet laugh.

“I really need you to cut it when you’re home.” His voice breaks. Brett knows he’s trying to control it, doesn’t want Brett to pay attention to it, so he doesn’t.

“Yeah. First thing I’ll do with my dodgy hand is put scissors near your beautiful head.”

Liam rolls a little, sniffles, wipes his eyes self-consciously. He still looks like he’s crying, so it doesn’t help much; he finds Brett’s bitten hand and takes it in his again, holding up the scar to the light.

It’s halfway between scarring and being a wound, but they’ve left the dressing off; it’s on the heel of his hand, too. It’s not a big wound, at any rate - Brett thinks of all the times Liam’s left little love-bites on his arms and chest and thinks that this one, on his hand, is probably only a fraction bigger.

Liam notices where he’s looking, turns around to look, and sniffles wetly. “It’s taking ages to heal,” he whispers, his voice shattered. “They said they were thinking about taking it off while you were out, because it might’ve gotten infected, but they saved it.”

Brett wiggles his fingers. There’s no pain at all - the area does feel like it’s got a pins-and-needles sensation going on near the edges, and the entire inside area is numb to sensation, but that’s nothing compared to what could have happened.

Liam shifts against him, then buries his face between Brett’s chest and arm. His breathing is shaky and laboured, like he wants to keep crying but he’s too exhausted to. His eyes are still streaming, though.

“Come back up here,” Brett murmurs. “Seriously, I haven’t showered in-”

“I sponged you while you were out.” Liam wipes his eyes. “The docs on TV always said that people in comas could like, hear what was going on, and feel things still. I didn’t want you to feel dirty or anything.”

Brett remembers, then, the vigils Liam used to hold. It’s vague, and he doesn’t remember much of them, what Liam said. But somehow, he was aware that Liam was there. “Thank you,” he murmurs. “How’ve you been doing?”

“I um, well, I had a breakdown after it happened,” Liam stammers, “but people were there, you know? I stayed with Stiles and Scott and Malia and Kira a lot. But after that I was okay, mostly. You can ask anyone.”

“You were okay?” Brett asks dubiously.

“Nobody would let me not be okay,” Liam sniffs. “I didn’t get the fuckin’ chance to even think.”

Brett smiles. “Remind me to thank them.”

Liam nods, sniffles. “Fuck. Sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s not okay. I’m getting tears and snot all over you. Do you know how much time I’ve spent fucking crying the last few weeks? Way too much. I’m gonna end up all shrivelled up like a raisin and you won’t think I’m hot anymore.”

“I’ll always think you’re hot,” Brett laughs, gathering Liam close. “And I don’t mind if you get tears and snot all over me.”

“You’re disgusting,” Liam sniffles wetly. “I bet you like it.”

Brett shrugs casually. Liam lifts his head and levels him with a watery glare. “Ew, dude.”

Brett tucks Liam closer to him. “Wanna sleep?” he asks.

“I just woke up.” But Liam yawns at the mention of it. “Maybe. Need anything?”

“I’m okay,” Brett says. “I’ve got you.”

~*~

“I found a chess set.”

Brett looks up; Liam’s entered, without knocking, which Brett is fairly sure is a habit he got from Brett - and is carrying a tattered plastic bag, smiling triumphantly.

“You found what?” Brett asks, smiling a little. He’s been feeling pretty miserable today - he just wants to get clean. Plus, Liam had to go on a scouting trip, and that was a while without him. Kira came with Lori, but she couldn’t stay forever, and it just wasn’t the same.

“A chess set.” Liam puts it down and climbs onto the bed, straddling Brett’s waist. “When we were scouting. I pilfered it.”

“Do you even know how to play?”

Liam blinks. “No. I figured you could teach me.”

“Yeah, okay,” Brett murmurs.

Liam puts it aside. “You okay?” he asks quietly.

Brett looks up at him. Liam’s solid - he’s gained all his muscle back and then some, filled out just in the time Brett was out. He looks strong - capable. Someone people can rely on. Brett’s dropped muscle mass, and while he’s still bigger than Liam, it’s an almost negligible difference. He feels really odd and self conscious about it. For as long as he’s known Liam, he’s always been distinctly bigger, distinctly stronger. He hadn’t realised before now how much of his self-worth hinged on his size.

“Yeah,” he says quietly.

Liam sits back, his feet on either side of Brett’s hips. “If you want me to leave you alone, I will,” he says.

“That’s not it at all,” Brett counters. “I want you here. Always.” He sighs, runs a hand through his hair - it’s greasy. “I just… I dunno. I don’t feel strong.”

Liam nods. “Yeah. I get it.”

“You do?”

“When I had that infection, I dropped loads of weight really fast,” Liam says. “I felt really off around you for ages because I felt so weak. Like I was a burden or something.” He eyes Brett unnervingly closely for a moment. “But it helped to get clean.”

Brett smiles a little.

“How come you haven’t showered?”

“I… I’m having trouble standing,” Brett admits. “And the nurses don’t really know what to do with me. They’re not really strong enough.”

Liam nods. “Want a shower now?”

“Liam-”

“Come on. You carried me around for ages when I was sick. I remember you putting me in the bath, you know. Don’t think I don’t.” Liam slides off the bed. “If you want to get clean, I’ll help you.”

“Really?”

“Yup.”

Brett hesitates, but he does really want to be clean. And Liam’s offering. So he lets Liam help him out of bed and into the small bathroom. Liam bears the majority of his weight across the room easily, holding tight to Brett’s arm and waist.

He sits down on the lid of the toilet, already feeling tired. Liam leans into the shower and turns it on - the infirmary is a converted hotel, and this particular room has a tub he’ll be able to sit in.

Brett watches Liam stretch, the easy, liquid movement of his muscles. He’ll be back to that soon enough, but right now, it doesn’t stop him feeling embarrassed.

Liam huffs, leaning out of the shower. “Okay,” he says cheerfully. “Let’s do this.”

“Is it warm?”

“Uh huh.” Liam smiles at him. “This first.”

He helps Brett get undressed, and Brett’s grateful that his eyes don’t linger too much over the areas he’s lost muscle mass. He knows he got off lightly - survivors of the Milwaukee protocol often had to go through rigorous physical therapy to be able to walk, talk and eat again - he can’t help but feel like the cost of having to do it is high. The cost of not doing it was his life, of course, but…

He looks at Liam. His hair is longer. Everyone’s suddenly switching out their long sleeves and jackets for short sleeves - Liam’s no exception, and he’s wearing a baggy black t-shirt that Brett thinks might actually be his. He’s even different facially - his jaw seems a little sharper, and his nose has somehow, inexplicably, changed shape. Brett knew Liam had more growing to do, but he didn’t realise he’d do most of it in a six-week period.

“What’s wrong?” Liam asks, stopping what he’s doing.

“I just - I missed so much.” He feels confused by it. “You look different, and everyone’s dressed differently.”

Liam’s face softens sympathetically. “I’ll look normal once you cut my hair,” he says, and Brett knows Liam’s trying to comfort him in the only way he knows how. He knows Liam will be able to help him through it - he just hopes the pressure doesn’t damage Liam’s psyche. It’s a lot to deal with, to be someone’s carer. Brett remembers the impact it had on his mom when his dad had the cancer.

“What’re you thinking about?” Liam asks, helping Brett upright and into the tub. Brett sits down gratefully, the warm water soothing on his muscles.

“Just my dad,” he says.

“Oh.” Liam settles next to the tub, lying his arms across the edge and putting his head on them. “Wanna talk about it?”

Brett shakes his head silently.

“Okay.” Liam watches him. “Is the water okay?”

“Yeah. Nice and warm. Thanks.”

“No problem.” Liam sits up properly. “I’m gonna find you some soap or something,” he murmurs.

Brett reaches out, catches Liam’s wrist as he goes to move away. “Liam,” he mumbles. “Look, I - I don’t… I’m not helpless, you know, I can do stuff for myself…”

Liam sits back down, looking a little lost. “I know. I want to help.”

Of course he does. Liam’s one of the most helpful little motherfuckers Brett’s ever met, and he doesn’t even try to be most of the time. He feels pretty shitty about himself as Liam looks away from him awkwardly, seeming almost upset.

_Good job, Brett. Hurting the one person who’s just trying to fucking help you._

There’s a long silence. Brett’s kind of wishing he’d let Liam get him some soap now; Liam’s sitting still, clearly not sure what to do with himself. He’s playing with his fingers now - using a thumbnail to pick nervously at the ragged cuticles of his other hand. He seems pretty absorbed by the task, but his shoulders are tense - he’s paying attention to Brett’s every move, even if he’s feigning ignorance.

“I’m not a good patient,” Brett says quietly. “I’m sorry. I’m used to being the nurse.”

Liam looks back at him, evidently reading the regret in his voice - he looks less nervous at any rate. “That’s okay,” he says earnestly. “Don’t worry about it.”

Brett’s throat closes up. He looks down.

“Do you remember when I had the infection?” Liam asks suddenly. “And I was really sick?”

How could he forget? “Yeah, I remember.”

“You got me into the bath,” Liam says. “When my fever spiked. I kind of remember it. You stripped me down and put me in the bath and stayed there for a few hours until my temperature was back down.”

Brett nods. “That was different,” he says softly. “You were completely incoherent, you were in pain, you were scared-”

“And remember the first few days after my fever broke?” Liam interrupts. “I couldn’t keep anything down and I could barely move still and you were really nice to me. I remember one time, I was crying because it hurt so bad but you couldn’t give me any more codeine than what you already had - so you spent ages boiling water to make it warm and got me into a bath and just kept topping up the warm water. I was there almost all day and it really helped.”

Brett does remember that. Mostly, he remembers how helpless he felt, being unable to reduce Liam’s pain and being unsure of what to do to help him at all.

“Then the next day,” Liam continues, “I remember, I still hadn’t been able to hold food down, and you said my blood sugar levels were probably really low - I was really lightheaded, remember? Anyway, you went outside and you came back in with fucking icy poles.”

Brett remembers that too. He’d mixed some sugar and salt into water - an attempt at getting Liam’s electrolytes back to normal in the absence of sports drinks - and left a bunch of containers outside, overnight, with sticks in them. The next morning, they’d frozen solid.

“That was great,” Liam says, smiling. “That was really fucking smart, you know? To freeze them like that? And I managed to have a couple and I didn’t throw up, and that’s when you started phasing soup back in, and then crackers, and then other stuff.”

“Why’re you telling me all this?” Brett asks.

“You’ve seen me at my worst,” Liam replies softly. “You’ve seen me close to death and if it hadn’t been for you I wouldn’t have made it. You’ve watched me have meltdowns and dissociate and cry and puke and God knows what else. I’m not judging you for anything, you know? If you need help, you need help. I did. I still do.”

Brett takes a deep breath - mainly to stave off the tears that are threatening to start up. Liam’s got a point. He just has to swallow his pride at some point and move on.

“Soap sounds nice,” he says, his voice breaking.

Liam smiles, gets up, and finds some soap in the cupboard. It’s a really girly scent - Brett’s hardly surprised to see it’s some sort of Bath and Body Works shit - but it’s soap, and he’ll feel cleaner.

“Here,” Liam says, putting it down with a washcloth.

“Can you do it?” Brett asks, and his voice breaks again. He doesn’t want to cry, but he’s so fucking tired, and he hates not being able to help himself - hates even more that he’s a burden on Liam as well.

Liam lathers the cloth up and starts with Brett’s shoulders, then his back. He’s tender as he works, gentle, as if Brett’s recovering from serious injury and not a coma. When Brett starts to shiver, Liam grabs a towel and starts patting dry the parts of Brett’s skin he’s already been over.

Brett watches Liam work, feeling weirdly emotional. He wonders if Liam missed his calling as a nurse. He wonders if Liam thinks less of him now that he’s having to care for Brett like he’s a newborn baby.

When Liam’s done, Brett sighs and leans back. He feels a little more human, at any rate - he gets his hair wet and washes it, watching as Liam blinks drowsily, then lets his eyes fall shut.

When he’s finished, he shakes Liam’s shoulder a bit. “I’m ready to get out,” he says quietly.

“Okay.” Liam yawns, pulls the plug, and helps Brett step out and towel off, then get dressed. He bears most of Brett’s weight back to the bed, yawning again as he helps Brett onto it.

“I’m sorry for getting snappy with you before,” Brett mumbles guiltily.

“That’s okay. I get it.”

Brett sighs shakily. Liam’s staying in the chair, where he hasn’t been for a while. “So,” Brett says. “Chess?”

Liam smiles. “Okay.” He grabs the bag and pulls out the box. “Where-”

“Come up here,” Brett says. “Don’t sit there. You aren’t a stranger.”

So Liam climbs up onto the bed, grabbing Brett’s food tray and putting it across his legs to set the board up on. It’s fun to watch Liam’s nose scrunch with confusion upon seeing how many pieces there are.

“Fuck. We haven’t even started and I’m already fucking lost.”

“I’ll go easy on you,” Brett promises.

Liam sits between Brett’s legs, his own hooked over Brett’s hips, on the opposite side of the board, watching attentively as Brett puts all the pieces in place. He realises, about five minutes in, that he’s seriously underestimated how long it takes to teach someone chess; Liam looks more and more confused with everything he says.

“So… the pawns can move two spaces at the start, and only one after that?”

“Yeah.”

“Who the fuck made that rule?” Liam grumbles, moving one of his pawns two spaces forward. “It’s a dumb one.”

Brett smiles a little, watching Liam’s eyebrows furrow as he tries to work out whether his move has cost him a piece. It could, but Brett said he’d go easy on Liam, and that doesn’t involve taking his pawn less than a minute into the game.

“Shit,” Liam says blankly. “I fucked up.”

Brett laughs. Liam looks surprised, then happy. Brett knows he’s been trying to cheer him up, and he appreciates it.

“Thanks, Liam,” he says.

“For what? Being bad at chess?”

“For being here,” Brett says.

Liam looks up at him. “Where else would I be?” he asks quietly.

_Somewhere you could be useful, instead of being my nursemaid_ , Brett thinks, but he doesn’t say it. Instead, he says, “You’ve left your queen wide open for my bishop, Li.”

Liam looks down at the board. “Which one is my queen?” he asks helplessly.

“This one.” Brett taps its head. “She’s not your most important piece but she’s your most powerful. She can go anywhere on the board.”

“So I’ll just move her out of the way, then.”

“She can’t jump,” Brett says, watching fondly as Liam’s eyebrows slant down in irritation. “She can do everything except jump pretty much. The only spot you can move her is where your pawn was, and that still leaves her open to my bishop.”

“What do they do again?”

“They can move diagonally in any direction.”

“Oh. _Oh_. Shit!”

“What’s going on in here, boys?”

They look up; Tamara’s standing in the doorway, smiling.

“I got us a chess set,” Liam mumbles. “And I’m already getting my ass kicked.”

Tamara peers over the board for a moment. Then, “Move your bishop in front of your queen. He’ll be able to get your bishop with his, but after that you can use your queen to take it. Then you can get your queen out onto the board.”

Liam grins. “Sweet.”

Tamara looks at Brett, smiling. “Am I supposed to help him?”

“I’m going easy on him. He doesn’t know how to play.”

“That’s sweet of you,” she says, and it seems like a genuine compliment. “Can I interrupt your game for a few minutes just to check you over?”

“Sure.” He makes a move and leaves Liam to puzzle over what he’s done, then stretches his arm out and allows Tamara to draw some of his blood. They’ve been testing him three times a day ever since he woke up, making sure the antibodies are still working. So far, the news is good, and it’s been almost a week.

“How’s the hand?” Tamara asks. “Don’t look, chicken.”

They’ve learned quickly that Liam’s even more adverse to seeing Brett’s blood than his own; he’s gone white, watching the needle. He looks away quickly, taking a deep breath; his hand is on Brett’s knee, over the blankets.

“It’s okay.” Brett lifts it up. “I can’t feel anything. Through here.” He traces the area. “Everything inside the teeth marks and an inch and a half outwards is totally numb.”

She nods, looking at it curiously. “The numbness hasn’t spread any?”

Liam looks up, clearly alarmed - he hasn’t considered that, judging by the look on his face. “No,” Brett says quickly. “No, it’s not spreading.”

“Hard to say what’s going on, then,” Tamara murmurs, inspecting his hand. “The flesh isn’t dead - it would be necrotising and causing infection if it was - and you seem to be able to move your thumb even though you can’t feel anything. That suggests to me that the nerves aren’t necessarily dead, just damaged. Unfortunately, the nerves are the only part of the human body, apart from the brain, that don’t regenerate.”

Brett shakes his head. “I don’t care,” he says softly. “I’m alive.”

~*~

Tamara finishes her check-up and then leaves, instructing both of them to sleep - she looks like she wants to whap Liam with a newspaper when he admits that he’s barely caught more than eight hours over the last few days.

“The best thing you can do for Brett right now is to rest and be strong enough to help him when he’s out of here,” she says, and somehow, it doesn’t come out scolding. If anything, she’s gentle, like she understands where Liam’s coming from.

“Okay,” Liam mumbles.

“I can bring you a cot, sweetie. So you can get some sleep?”

“I like sleeping up here,” Liam says, almost defensively, as he curls towards Brett’s body. “As long as he doesn’t mind that is.”

“He doesn’t,” Brett says, mostly to remind them he’s actually present.

“Okay.” Tamara stretches; her back cracks. “How about this? I’ll bring you boys some more pillows and blankets.” She sighs when she looks at them. “You’ve been through the wringer, both of you,” she murmurs. “Nobody’s going to begrudge you sleeping together.”

By the time she comes back, Liam’s already passed out cold against Brett’s shoulder. Brett thinks he might be drooling a little bit, but he doesn’t care; it’s nice to feel Liam’s long, even exhales against his arm.

Tamara comes back with extra pillows and blankets, as promised, and a few snacks for if they get hungry. She smiles softly when she sees Liam resting against Brett.

“He hasn’t left, you know.”

“I know.” Brett’s immensely grateful for it, even as he wishes Liam would take care of himself. “Don’t they need him outside?”

“They’ve got a few others who can work now,” Tamara says. “Logan can try whatever he wants. We swore when you were bitten that we weren’t going to let anything happen to Liam, and we’re going to uphold that.”

Brett nods. He owes them all for looking after Liam while he couldn’t - while Liam couldn’t do it himself. “Thank you,” he murmurs.

She smiles. “Anytime, chicken.” She kisses his forehead. “Get some rest.”

“I will. Thanks. And you too, you know? You look tired.”

“No rest for the wicked,” she sighs. “I’ll be back later, take another sample. Try to sleep.”

“Mm.” He already feels tired; as she shuts the door softly, he takes a moment to make sure Liam’s tucked up under the blankets. He might not be able to do much in the way of helping Liam right now - but he can make sure his boyfriend is warm and not going to get sick.

He smiles sleepily when Liam snuggles down against him. Liam’s warm, a comforting presence in the bed, and if Brett focuses on him, he can forget about the monotonous beeps around him, about the footsteps outside his room, about everything.

_He’s cute when he’s asleep_ , Brett thinks, and then he’s out.

~*~

The door’s opening when he wakes up.

He looks around sleepily, then smiles as he sees Malia and Kira walk in - Kira’s holding Lori in her arms.

“Hi,” she whispers. “Sorry, did we wake you up?”

He shakes his head. “Doesn’t matter. Been sleeping for ages.” He kisses Lori’s head; she blinks at him curiously.

“What about him?” Malia asks, gesturing to Liam.

Brett looks. Liam’s curled up on his side, legs tangled with Brett’s, the covers pulled up and over his nose. He’s still fast asleep by the looks of it.

“He could sleep through a nuclear warhead going off next to him,” Brett murmurs. “Thanks for coming to see me.” He smiles. “You brought Lori.”

“Yep.” Kira passes Lori to him; she’s sleeping, and she barely stirs as she’s transferred into Brett’s arms. She’s starting to look a lot less squished and wrinkled and more like an actual human baby - complete with Kira’s round cheeks.

Liam stirs vaguely. “Baby,” he mumbles.

“Isn’t he good at identifying things?” Brett asks the girls, who both smile and laugh. “Good job, Li.”

“I’ll kill you.” Liam shuffles up the bed sleepily and peers at Lori. “Hmm. Hi.”

“Hi, Li,” Kira says. “Good sleep?”

“No, I woke up.” Liam yawns. “Hey, Mal.”

“Hey,” Malia says. She looks sort of serious. “Can I talk to you outside for a moment?”

Liam seems almost immediately awake. “Sure.” He slips off the bed carefully. “Brett, you want anything to eat?”

“No, I’m okay. Thanks though.”

Liam and Malia head out into the hallway; Brett watches, rocking Lori a little bit when she stirs, then passing her back to Kira. She seems happier there anyway.

“What are they talking about?” Brett asks Kira softly.

She looks towards the door. “I’m not sure,” she murmurs back.

Brett watches through the window. Liam’s staring into Malia’s face attentively, which is unusual for Liam, who’s fairly uncomfortable with eye contact at the best of times. Malia either doesn’t make him nervous anymore, or it’s important that he pays attention.

Even as he watches, Liam’s eyebrows suddenly slant downwards, angrily, and his jaw clenches. He looks frightening, almost, when he does that - older, more severe, much less likely to play nice. Brett remembers that look - it was Liam’s permanent expression for their first few weeks together. It certainly kept Brett from even considering looting him, let alone trying anything else.

Liam nods at Malia suddenly, says something. Brett can’t see what from here, though.

“Don’t ask him,” Kira advises. Lori coos in her arms. “He won’t say. Malia won’t tell me either, even though she’s given up on pretending there’s nothing going on.”

“Liam’s shit at lying,” Brett says. “At least to me. He’ll spill eventually just because he feels guilty.”

“He’s a pretty good actor with anyone else,” Kira says thoughtfully. “He’s got Logan thinking he’s terrified of him.”

“Pfft,” Brett snorts. “Liam could run circles around Logan. Logan might be smart, but his ego is the size of Jupiter. If Liam gives him what he wants he’ll lap it up.”

Liam looks into the room. His expression melts into a smile when he looks at Brett; he gives a little wave. Brett waves back.

“He only looks at you like that, you know,” Kira says with a smile.

Something in Brett’s chest shifts uncomfortably. He’s about to reply when the door opens, and Malia and Liam walk back in. Malia looks serious, but Liam’s putting on a happy face. He’s getting remarkably good at it, and Brett would think it was a good thing if it weren’t for the fact that Liam’s probably been using it as a defence mechanism while he’s been unconscious.

“Do you guys know anything about chess?” Liam asks as he settles back onto the bed with Brett. He doesn’t seem shy about letting Kira and Malia see him snuggling up close. That’s a little different; Liam’s never been adverse to people knowing about them, but he’s always been a little iffy about public affection.

“No,” Malia admits.

“Only a little,” Kira says. “I know a lot about Go.”

“Damn, okay,” Liam sighs.

“Why?” Malia asks.

“I found a chess set,” Liam says proudly. “But I uh… don’t really know how to play and Brett’s kicking my ass.”

“I’m going easy on you!” Brett retorts with a grin.

“You need to go easier,” Liam grumbles. “I still don’t remember what the fu - fudge the horse is supposed to do.”

They all smile as Liam almost swears and trips over himself not to around Lori. “It’s called a knight, Liam,” Brett says.

Liam narrows his eyes. “Is it or is it not shaped like a fu - fudging horse?”

“I suppose it is.”

“And is there a person on it?”

“No,” Brett laughs.

“Then it’s not a knight, it’s a _horse!”_

“Okay,” Kira giggles. “We’ll leave you to your debate. That way Liam doesn’t have to burst a blood vessel trying not to cuss.” She kisses Brett’s cheek and Liam’s forehead. “It’s really good to have you back, Brett.”

He smiles. “Good to be back.”

Malia gives them both brief, somewhat awkward hugs before they leave; Liam’s got the chess set out and he’s trying to set it up, even though he still doesn’t really remember where any of the pieces go.

“Who the fuck thought of this game anyway?” Liam mutters. “Oh, let’s get fucking a million tiny pieces of wood - make sure there’s at least eight of the same piece too - and write really elaborate rules for what they can and can’t do.”

Brett watches him set the pieces up - the right way, after a lot of hesitation. He’s thinking about Malia asking Liam to talk in the hallway - how serious Liam looked. The chess thing is striking Brett very much like a more elaborate version of one of Liam’s diversionary tactics.

“What’re you planning?” Brett asks slowly.

Liam looks at him like he’s a deer caught in the headlights. “… Nothing,” he lies.

“Right,” Brett snorts disbelievingly.

“I…” Liam looks down at his hands. “I don’t… I’m not supposed to tell you.”

“Why not?” Brett asks. “Liam, I’m not an invalid, I can handle whatever you want to-”

“I’m not supposed to tell anyone.” Liam’s visibly upset. “Okay? It’s not about you being in the hospital. We’re meant to be keeping it under wraps.”

“Are you in trouble?” Brett murmurs.

“Not right now.” Liam shifts uneasily. “Look, you can’t tell anyone, okay?” he whispers.

“Okay, I won’t. Promise.”

Liam takes a deep breath. “It was Logan,” he says in an exhale. “Logan was the one who made the holes in the wall.”

Brett’s whole world turns upside down very abruptly. “What?”

Liam nods. “Mal and I went out there. A scrap of his shirt was on the metal. There was blood too, but we can’t know if it’s his or not because Tamara can’t do DNA testing with the stuff she has here. We just know it was from a person, because zombies don’t bleed that kind of blood.”

“Liam, if he was the one who put the holes there, why isn’t he locked up?” Brett demands. “He’s dangerous, he-”

“We don’t have solid proof and most of the people here still like him,” Liam says. “Brett, we can’t just fucking kidnap him and throw him to the zombies. People believe in him. They’re not going to believe us if we tell them the holes were made from the inside, by their leader, with the purpose of letting zombies in to kill them.”

Brett sits back. That’s a good point. “But why?” he asks.

“Malia thinks he wants to start something with the Keepers,” Liam replies. “Maybe even Oakridge. He wants an excuse to invade other peoples’ land and take their stuff and claim it as his own. If he could convince people that someone else made those holes, it’d be really easy to mount an army against the people he pins it on.”

“He wants to start something with the cannibalistic slave traders?”

“Yup.”

“So what’re we gonna do?”

“We’re working on that,” Liam says quietly. “We need a way to like… discredit him or whatever. I think Stiles is working on that.”

Brett nods; Stiles is pretty crafty. “That’s good.”

Everything adds up now. Everything Liam’s said about people watching out for him, and Tamara promising to keep Liam safe. Logan’s after him to do something, and Brett doesn’t want to wait to find out what it is.

~*~

He’s released from the infirmary half a week later.

He’s still wobbly on his feet a little, shaky, and pretty tired. But he’s glad to be up, and as he’s packing his things up to leave, Liam’s pretty much bouncing around him excitedly - exactly like a puppy would.

Liam’s been good. He hasn’t dissociated or even really broken down - he’s cried a few times, but Brett can’t blame him for that. He cried a lot when Liam had his infection and Brett thought he’d die. Death is harder on the living than it is on the dead.

He’s amazed when he steps outside to find it actually warm. Not really warm - Liam still shivers a little as he steps into the breeze - but warm enough to not really need a jacket or even a flannel shirt. He smiles.

“The sun’s out.”

Liam beams at him as he hops down the steps with Brett’s stuff, Fudge hot on his heels. Brett’s throat tightens at the image of his boyfriend - who, really, has needed a break for the last two or three years - bounding around happily with his dog.

_Didn’t think I’d get to see that again_ , he thinks as he walks down the steps carefully.

“Liam!”

He blinks, turns around. Savannah’s running up to Liam and throwing her arms around his waist. He hugs her back, still smiling. “Hey, Sav.”

“There are eggs in the birdhouse!” she chatters excitedly as Brett approaches them. “Daddy said it was because of how you built it - with the tree and stuff!”

“Ah, well, I know some stuff,” Liam says. “Did Daddy tell you not to touch the eggs?”

“Yup. He said that if I did the mama bird might not want ‘em.”

“Yeah. He’s right. But hey, you might have little chicks to look at soon. That’d be cool.”

Savannah’s eyes land on Brett. “You’re better!” she says with a smile, then gives him a huge, squeezing hug as well. “Momma told me you were doing good!”

“Doing well,” Liam corrects her idly.

“Doing well.”

“Yeah, I’m as good as new,” Brett says. “Did Liam build you a birdhouse?”

“Yeah,” Savannah says proudly. “He told me I had to really take care of the birds though. And I do. I put seeds and stuff out for them every day.”

Brett looks at Liam; he’s blushing, looking down at his feet.

Savannah looks to Liam next. “Are you going home?” she asks curiously.

“Yeah. Brett needs lots of sleep. And so do I really.”

She nods seriously. “You look tired, buddy.”

Liam laughs. “I am. That’s okay though. Still got that magic charm you gave me.”

“Really?”

Liam holds his wrist up - Brett suddenly takes notice of the brightly coloured, woven bracelet wrapped around it. “See?”

“Is it still working?”

“It’s working great, Sav.”

“Okay.” She looks at Brett. “I’m gonna make you one too,” she says. “Don’t worry, I’ll make it the same as Liam’s. He’s your boyfriend so you gotta match.” She gives him a hug, then Liam. “Bye!”

“Bye, Sav,” Liam says, smiling fondly and watching her run off.

Brett looks at Liam. “Magic charm, huh?”

“Yeah. She made it for me when I was staying at their house. I was, uh…” Liam looks a little reluctant. “I was having nightmares, and she made me this.” He holds up his wrist again; the bracelet’s purple and blue and green, knotted to stop it falling off. “She said it’d protect me from the baddies.”

“And did it?”

“I didn’t have as many nightmares.”

“That’s good.”

They run into a few more people on the way home - James, who shakes Brett’s hand and, to Brett’s total surprise, gives Liam a warm hug and a clap on the shoulder. After that, they run into April and Brad, Zack’s parents, who tell him Zack’s doing well and is home resting. Mr. Yukimura stops them to thank Liam for all the baby clothes and toys he brought back for Lori and some of the younger kids around.

It’s only once they’re waving goodbye to the Cirellos - an elderly Italian couple with thick accents, even now - that Brett realises everyone in the community has something positive to say about Liam. Not a single person has let them pass without flagging him down, and Liam hasn’t flinched from any of them.

“Do you have to poop right there?” Liam complains as Fudge squats in the grass near the house. “I have to clean that up now.” He’s unlocking the front door.

Brett stops him. “I’m really proud of you,” he says softly.

Liam blinks. “Huh?”

“I’m proud of you.”

“Why? I haven’t done anything.”

Brett shakes his head. “You could’ve just left,” he says. “Gotten out of here and left everyone behind. Or laid down and died. But you didn’t. These people love you, Liam. They trust you.”

“They love and trust you too,” Liam says, blinking. “You had loads of visitors when you were unconscious.”

“I did?”

“Yeah.” He motions down the road. “The Cirellos brought you so many fucking flowers we had to start giving them to other patients.”

With that, he steps inside. The house is dark and cool, and the first thing Brett notices is that the living room is a veritable bombsite - there are books and clothes strewn everywhere, and the couch is piled high with blankets and pillows. The kitchen is empty of any perishable food.

His stomach turns. Liam didn’t live well when he was out. By the looks of it, he suffered. “Liam?” he asks softly.

“Yeah?”

“Where did you sleep?” He didn’t expect his voice to break. But the couch looks well-worn with Liam’s body weight, and it wouldn’t have gotten or stayed like that after one or two nights.

Liam looks uncomfortable. “Um… Scott and Stiles’ the first few nights. Then with James and his family… Tamara… Malia and Kira. Otherwise I slept on the couch.”

_It wasn’t just a few people who took care of him_ , Brett realises. _It was all of them. They all looked out for him at some point or another._

He looks around. The kitchen knives are gone - and so is everything else sharp. Liam watches him look around, his hands in his pockets, his face worried.

“Did you try to kill yourself?” Brett asks, trying not to let his voice break.

“No,” Liam says. “No, I really didn’t. The first day after you were bitten I - well I don’t know what happened. Not really. I dissociated for the whole day and most of the night. I guess they thought I might hurt myself while I was like that. Stiles and Scott came through and took everything sharp - even our razors. Well, I mean, I guess that’s what happened, anyway. I had to go shave at their house. I also apparently consented to having my blood drawn for a vaccine and I don’t remember that either.”

“They drew your blood when you were fucking catatonic?” Brett yells.

Liam flinches. “I had what Tamara called a functioning episode,” he says, in a vaguely pleading tone of voice. “I was walking and talking and acting pretty normally from what everyone’s told me - it was way later that they realised I’d checked out.”

Brett’s still livid, though. He would’ve known. He would’ve known Liam was dissociating and he never would have drawn blood from him like that.

“Brett, I’m glad they did it,” Liam says. “The vaccine worked. Who cares if I remember it or not? I hate having my blood drawn, it’s probably a really good thing I don’t remember.”

“They took advantage of you,” Brett says weakly.

Liam strides over and kneels down in front of him, staring up into Brett’s eyes with such intensity Brett almost wants to look away. “ _Nobody_ took advantage of me,” Liam says. “I’ll say it until you realise it’s true - nobody took advantage of me. They protected me. Not just from Logan or anything else, either - Kira and Malia were constantly making sure I ate and Scott and Stiles played basketball with me until I was too tired to dream about anything and James and his family gave me project after project to keep me busy and occupied. Tamara let me sleep in her office, on her couch, fuck, anywhere she was when I needed company. The only person who was anything less than nice was Logan, and he barely got anywhere near me.”

Logan. Brett doesn’t miss the way Liam says his name - like it’s a slur, or like it tastes bad on his tongue and between his teeth. Brett doesn’t blame him. Still, he’d love to know exactly what happened before he woke up… because Liam didn’t like Logan before, but now he seems to downright despise him. The holes in the wall is one thing… but there’s something deeper in Liam’s eyes, some hatred that’s vastly more personal.

Liam sighs. “C'mon,” he says. “Let’s go to bed. I’m tired.”

He does look tired - there are deep bruises under his eyes and his shoulders are slumped. Brett feels a pang of remorse deep in his stomach; no teenager should have to look that exhausted just from the effort of living.

He follows Liam into the bathroom. In another world, Liam would probably be sprawled out on his bed, playing the PlayStation and messing around with his friends. Probably getting into trouble if Brett knows him well enough. Maybe hooking up with random people. Filling out college applications.

He’s not going to get any of that, Brett realises, watching as Liam gets into the shower. He’s not going to get to dick around and be a teenager and goof off. He’s not going to get to choose what he wants to do in college or panic over student loans or eat cereal for dinner.

His stomach turns. Liam’s going to be living by the skin of his teeth for the rest of his life, having hardly known anything different. Brett’s sure you could probably pinpoint the exact moment his heart shatters. Instead of getting wasted, Liam gets to deal with a PTSD diagnosis and frequent episodes of dissociation.

“Brett?” Liam asks. “You just gonna stand there?”

Brett swallows. “Be there soon.”

Liam turns to him, blinking water out of his eyes. “What’s wrong?” he asks curiously. “You look sad.”

Distraught is probably a better word for it, but right now, if Liam said something like that, Brett would probably have a meltdown at the difference between before his bite and after. “I uh - no,” he mumbles.

Liam blinks. “C'mon,” he says softly. “Get in.”

Brett strips off and joins Liam in the shower; the water’s warm. It seems to have revitalised Liam a little bit, because he looks slightly chirpier.

“Better,” he says with a small smile.

They don’t stay in long. Brett’s still tired just from standing around for too long; Liam pays more attention to him than usual, soaping him up and then rinsing him down carefully, all over. Brett would protest at being treated like an invalid, but Liam’s hands feel nice against his skin, and he’s drowsy.

When they step out, Liam towels him off first, standing there dripping on the tiles as he does. He doesn’t seem to mind, even as he shivers a little. Brett’s content to let Liam help him get dressed, too.

When they enter the bedroom, it hits Brett all over again. Liam hasn’t slept here for a few weeks. The bed is completely untouched from the last time Brett left it - covers pulled back, because neither of them are making-the-bed-in-the-morning people, and things strewn everywhere. Books on Brett’s side and what looks like a writing pad and pen on Liam’s side.

He’s immediately curious. He didn’t know Liam wrote. He knows it’s Liam’s writing, too, because it’s smudged and slanted - Liam’s left handed and constantly bemoaning the fact that most tools seem to be made for right handed people.

Liam sees him looking. “I started, um,” he says uncomfortably, and then falls silent. He picks up the pad and pen and throws them into the bedside table’s drawer, closing it and settling down on the mattress, almost nervously - like it contains germs or something. Like he’s scared of it.

Brett hesitates before sitting down next to him. “You started?” he prompts gently. He can see that Liam wants to talk about it, but Liam’s always needed to be prompted when it comes to personal stuff. If he doesn’t talk, Brett will leave it alone.

Liam fidgets. “Uh,” he says. “When you were out, I… well, I used to talk to you about stuff. But you weren’t… I mean I talked to you, a lot, um, but it mostly just made me sad, so I started…”

“… Writing?” Brett guesses after Liam’s silent for a moment.

Liam nods.

“That’s good,” Brett says. “I’m glad you did. Did it help?”

“A little. Mostly it was just, I don’t know. Stuff I was too scared to admit out loud, even to Fudge.”

Brett looks. Fudge is already at the end of the bed, watching them sleepily. His ears quirk when Brett looks at him, and he gives a soft whine, like he’s confirming what Liam said.

“You can read it if you want,” Liam mumbles.

Brett smiles. “Only if you want me to, okay?”

Liam nods.

“Okay. You wanna get under the covers?”

Liam nods again, this time a little more eagerly, and climbs into bed. Brett watches as he melts against the mattress and pillow, his eyes already closed, his whole body seeming to sigh with relief. Brett knows that feeling - the utter exhaustion of dropping into bed at the end of a long week and praying the linen swallows you whole.

He reaches out, strokes Liam’s chest - he isn’t wearing a shirt tonight. Liam’s eyes open straight away, and he sighs as he moves closer.

_He hasn’t been touched in six weeks_ , Brett realises. Probably hasn’t touched himself either.

He hesitates. He wants Liam, as close as he can get him - and Liam seems on board, judging by the way his boxers are slowly beginning to tent. But he’s just… too tired. The idea of having to haul Liam’s weight around - the way Liam prefers to be handled, generally - is daunting to think about.

Liam nudges closer to him. “What’re you thinking?” he mumbles, eyes still shut. He’s paying attention though - his whole body is paying attention.

There is something they could do. Brett told Liam he wanted Liam to go on top at some point; he wasn’t lying. He does want that. And now, when he’s kind of too exhausted to be able to screw Liam through the mattress…

“Come here,” Brett says softly.

Liam hesitates. “Where do you want me?”

“Anywhere,” Brett murmurs, smiling a bit at Liam’s hesitation. He tugs on Liam’s waist - he’s tired and wants Liam to come to him.

There’s a brief moment’s hesitation as Liam rises up a little, then clambers on top of his body. He sits astride Brett’s hips easily, unselfconsciously. “Here?”

“I was thinking closer.” He leads Liam down, slowly, until Liam gets the point and lies on top of Brett, with Brett’s thighs bracketing his hips. This feels new to Brett, strange - Liam’s a foreign weight there, in a way he hasn’t been before, peering up at him curiously. Brett thinks of all the times their positions have been reversed - of how Liam’s gripped him tightly, just to get the point across that he really wants Brett to fuck him.

Brett doesn’t know how to ask for that, so he uses language Liam’s fluent in - the unspoken kind. He uses his knees to get a grip on Liam’s ribs and give him a soft squeeze. He wants Liam to be able to back out if he doesn’t want to do this. Brett wouldn’t blame him; his timing is pretty odd, what with it being his first night out of the hospital.

Liam obviously doesn’t think about that; he moves up Brett’s body and kisses him, his hands on the mattress next to Brett’s head. “Are you sure?” he murmurs.

“Yeah. I really want you to. Please.”

Liam reaches over him to grab their lube. “Um,” he says. “We don’t… have any condoms my size, so… do you… do you want me to pull out before I finish?”

“That’s considerate of you,” Brett teases. “No. I’m fine.”

“Sure?”

“Yeah.”

“Let me know if you change your mind.” With that, Liam’s tugging Brett’s sweats down and nosing at his boxers fondly. “Hmm.”

“Miss me?”

“More than anything ever.”

Brett relaxes back into the mattress as Liam teases him - palms him through his boxers and gets him hard before tugging them down, as well, and ditching them with the sweats. “Let me know if it hurts, okay?” he asks nervously. “I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“Yeah you do. Just do what I do to you.”

Liam uncaps the lube and gets some on his fingers. “Cold,” he warns, and then he’s smearing some on Brett’s entrance.

Brett shivers at the sensation; he wasn’t expecting this particular part of the process to feel so good. There must be about a thousand nerve endings down there; Liam’s smiling at him fondly, watching him shake.

“Tingly, huh?”

“Yeah.” He adjusts a little. “What’s it gonna feel like?”

Liam’s face twists in confusion for a moment. “Um… I guess… kind of full? Lots of pressure? It’s good though. Like when it’s done right, it’s good.”

“So it’s gonna feel good?” Brett asks, mostly so Liam relaxes a little.

“I mean, I hope so,” Liam murmurs. “Don’t give me credit yet.”

Brett doesn’t have to think. It’s either gonna feel good or Liam’s not gonna go through with it. He knows that. Especially with what Liam went through with Garrett, he won’t risk it not feeling good.

“You ready?” Liam asks hesitantly.

“Yep. I’m excited.”

Liam smiles at him. Then, slowly, he’s pressing, and Brett’s body gives way to him. It feels overwhelmingly strange for a moment, but Liam’s going slow and Brett adjusts to the sensation. Now he’s sort of nervous.

Liam looks up at his face. “Okay?”

“Yeah. Feels weird.”

“Yeah, this isn’t the good bit yet. Amateur.”

Brett laughs. Liam smiles, like he’s surprised that worked, and goes back to what he was doing - starts stroking inside Brett, and, okay, that’s starting to feel pretty nice. Brett’s sort of surprised that Liam’s description of what it would feel like is spot-on.

He leans his head back on the pillow with a sigh, letting Liam stretch him contentedly. He’s half-hard and this is really nice. Relaxing, even. Brett wonders if for some reason it feels better for Liam, because Liam makes a hell of a lot more noise than this would warrant, and-

“Fuck,” he moans, surprised - there’s a sudden wave of pleasure rippling down his pelvis and thighs and belly. Liam grins at him.

“This is the good bit.”

“What was that?” he breathes - like he even needs to ask. That, he’s assuming, was the little bundle of nerves that makes Liam melt bonelessly against the bed when Brett fingers him.

Liam doesn’t answer; he’s grinning happily. “This is awesome.”

“Agreed,” Brett says faintly. “Can you do that again?”

“This?” Liam strokes, presses - Brett’s dick jumps against his stomach.

“Yeah, yeah, that.” Now he gets it; now he knows how he’s able to reduce Liam to a begging mess within minutes. Liam’s stroking gently, but Brett usually goes for it, and that has to feel fucking intense. He wonders if Liam will try.

“Another finger,” Liam warns.

“Okay.” He shifts as it slides in next to the first one; that feels slightly harder to take, but not by much, and Liam’s moving slowly, watching Brett’s face. He’s not sure why Liam said he doesn’t know what he’s doing; he clearly does, even if he’s just winging it.

“You’re doing great,” he whispers, trying to keep his voice even. Liam, obviously not satisfied with that, quirks his fingers upwards. Brett whimpers helplessly, but he doesn’t blush as Liam grins at him.

“Having fun?” Liam asks.

“Lots. Are you?”

“Mhm.” Liam leans over him, planting his lips at the start of Brett’s mandala tattoo and beginning to inch his way downwards slowly. Brett’s breath is coming faster now; he watches the muscular planes of Liam’s back and shoulders shift in the half-light.

Liam plants a soft, prolonged kiss on Brett’s lower belly before his tongue rasps up the underside of Brett’s dick. Brett swears his breathing stops; he waits, breath baited, for Liam to do something.

He doesn’t have to wait long. Liam takes Brett in his mouth, gently, with no sense of urgency, and begins to bob his head at a leisurely pace. That, combined with his careful stimulation of Brett’s prostate, is almost too much to take; Brett groans and reaches down to grab Liam’s hair.

Liam glances up at him. Then, after a moment, his free hand settles on Brett’s thigh, stroking, and a third finger nudges insistently at his entrance.

Brett takes a deep breath and forces himself to relax. Liam hums approvingly as he slides in with relative ease; it only burns for a second before settling.

He feels almost bad; he’s not sure he’s ever been this gentle or thorough with Liam. He’s never hurt him, sure, but he’s probably never been like this. Liam never asked for anything different, but…

Liam pulls away from him. “Does it feel okay?” he rasps.

“Yeah,” Brett breathes. There are waves of pleasure crashing over him; Liam’s found the perfect spot inside him. “Yeah, it feels great.”

Liam smiles almost shyly. “Cool.”

Brett lifts his head, looks down. “Are you-”

“Yeah, I’m hard,” Liam says. “I’m a teenager. It doesn’t take much.”

Brett laughs breathlessly. Liam’s smile widens happily.

“Hey,” Brett says. “Hey, I think I’m okay now.”

“Sure?” Liam asks.

“Yeah.” He doesn’t bother telling Liam to be gentle; he’s been really gentle so far, almost exceedingly so. He blinks when Liam pulls out - it’s a strange sensation, leaves him feeling empty and a little bit lost - and then wipes his hand carefully before reaching for the lube again.

He looks at Brett as he slicks himself up. “Please tell me if it hurts,” he says nervously.

“I will,” Brett promises. “Now c'mon - you seem to really enjoy yourself whenever you’re the one on your back, so-”

Liam smiles, and then he’s guiding himself to Brett’s entrance. “Try breathing out,” he advises as he nudges there - Brett’s heart slams against his ribcage despite his best efforts. “It helps a little.”

So Brett breathes out as Liam continues to apply pressure - and then, suddenly, he’s sliding in slowly. Even though he tries heeding Liam’s words, Brett’s breath gets stuck in his throat and suddenly, he’s holding it.

Liam pauses. “Are you okay?” he asks, watching Brett’s face carefully.

“It feels really weird,” Brett breathes, shifting a little at the sensation. Liam’s right - it feels like pressure, like a lot of pressure, and it’s burning a little bit. He was expecting it to hurt worse, but Liam did spend a long time prepping him.

“It does until you get used to it,” Liam says. “I’ll stop if you want.”

“I don’t. Maybe, uh - can you keep going? Until you bottom out?”

Liam gives him a slightly worried look, but he continues to push inside, slowly, and Brett tries to focus on the worry on Liam’s face melting away to pleasure - his eyes shut, and he breathes out shakily, and Brett remembers he’s never been on top before - that Liam’s never had sex with a girl either.

It’s easier to focus on Liam’s pleasure than whatever discomfort he’s feeling; Liam feels huge inside him, even though Brett knows that while Liam’s maybe bigger than average, he’s not big enough to warrant feeling like this.

Liam comes to a stop inside him, shivering, and lies flat against Brett’s torso, giving a brief moan of satisfaction. The noise goes straight to Brett’s cock - which had been flagging before, and is now rising with interest. Maybe it’s a little confused about not being sheathed in Liam’s body.

“You okay?” Liam breathes shakily.

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Brett’s surprised that his own voice comes out trembling as well; he clenches, almost involuntarily, and Liam’s fingers - which are holding Brett’s sides - bite into his skin and drag down a little.

“Don’t do that yet,” Liam says weakly. “I’ll come.”

“Don’t come before you fuck me, Liam.”

“That’s the idea.” Liam rises up a little, looking at Brett; his cheeks are red, and he’s covered in a light sheen of sweat, making him almost glow. “It doesn’t hurt?”

“It doesn’t hurt,” Brett says quickly, “just um, let me adjust?”

“Yeah, of course.” Liam settles on his elbows, watching Brett and finally giving him a small smile. “So. How’re the kids? Did you get that promotion? Oh, have you tried that fantastic new casserole recipe Carol posted on Pinterest?”

Brett laughs at Liam’s attempt at stereotypical small-talk. He knows Liam’s trying to take his mind off any potential pain and he appreciates it, immensely. Plus, it really drives it home that this is Liam - his temperamental, sweet, loyal dork of a boyfriend who didn’t stray from his side even once while he was out. Everything else might have changed, but Liam’s still his, and that’s the most important thing.

“You can move,” he says after a moment; he feels pretty well-adjusted.

Liam goes up onto his hands. “This might be the worst lay of your life,” he warns.

“It won’t be. Dude, my ex broke up with me while I was fucking her. The only way this could be worse was if you broke up with me while you were fucking me.”

Liam laughs breathlessly - he pulls back, then pushes forward again, slowly, and the motion brushes Brett’s prostate. The motion sends ripples of pleasure right through his body, and he spasms around Liam.

“Stop doing that,” Liam moans. “Seriously, I-”

“Not on purpose,” Brett whispers back. “Can’t help it.” He bites back a needy sound when Liam thrusts again, a little faster, a little harder. He seems to be trying to work out how to move his hips properly.

Brett grabs a pillow. “Here,” he says. “Straighten up a little, put this under my butt.”

Liam does what Brett tells him to - and looks promptly delighted. “That’s much better,” he says, then starts to pick up the pace.

“Yeah, I can tell,” Brett groans. “Fuck, you know what you’re doing, just go.”

Liam’s hips only stutter uncertainly for a few seconds before he starts evening out his pace - Brett finds himself clutching the sheets at the sensation of Liam sliding in and out of him, overwhelmed by the pressure and fullness. Liam’s hands are on the tops of his thighs, keeping his legs still, and he’s definitely worked out what he’s doing.

“Liam,” Brett pants. “Can you-”

Liam lurches down, and Brett tries to lift up to meet him in a kiss - Liam’s short enough that it’s a little difficult, and he can’t blanket Brett’s body with his own the way Brett can for him. But he’s solid and hot between Brett’s hips, muscular, and every part of Brett is throbbing with pleasure.

“Liam,” he gasps.

Liam moans in response - this one sounds different than usual, too, more desperate, and he goes suddenly still inside Brett. He’s trembling all over; Brett realises he’s sitting on the edge of his orgasm and trying not to come desperately.

He wraps his arms around Liam’s shoulders and starts stroking his shoulder blades - Liam’s back is muscular with all the physical work he’s been doing, more toned than Brett’s ever seen it. He marvels at how Liam shifts underneath his hands, gratefully, like he’s glad for a distraction.

“Can you hold off?” Brett whispers. Liam’s hard as a rock inside him, pressed right up as close as he can get. Liam shivers.

“Mhm.” His voice is high. “Sorry, it’s been a while.”

“That’s okay.” Brett moves a little bit. “This feels great,” he sighs.

“Really?”

“Yeah. Why’re you so surprised?”

“Thought I’d be shit at it.” Liam begins to straighten up again and starts to move; Brett lets his head thump back into the pillow when Liam nudges his prostate insistently. His lower back is tingling, which he really didn’t expect.

I should’ve done this way sooner, he thinks vaguely as Liam pulls almost all the way out, then pushes back in. His eyebrows crease together; Brett watches the muscles in his shoulders strain as he plants his hands on the bed next to Brett’s head and begins to thrust in earnest.

“Oh, shit,” Brett moans. “That’s-” Incredible, amazing-

He reaches down and gets a hand around his cock, which is leaking on his stomach, and begins to stroke. Liam’s got his head down, but Brett can see his face - his mouth is open and his eyes are closed, his abs working with every thrust. Brett uses his free hand to hold onto the back of Liam’s neck, and Liam arches up into the touch. Brett had forgotten that was an erogenous zone.

This is great, but he won’t come like this, and Liam’s looking like he’s rapidly heading towards orgasm. “Liam,” he breathes. “Can you go harder?”

“Yeah.” Liam’s voice is trembling, but he picks up the pace, and now Brett’s sweet spot is being hammered mercilessly.

He’s so caught up in the pleasure - barely paying attention to the sounds he’s making - that it takes him a moment to register Liam making a long, needy groan. Brett recognises that sound; Liam’s going to come really soon.

“Liam,” he breathes. “I-”

Liam picks up the pace, and it’s an almost infinitesimal change, but it sends Brett right over the edge - he comes hard, pretty much whimpering, on his stomach and chest. That’s when he feels Liam’s thrusts get less even, shaky, and-

He’s surprised that he can feel Liam jerk inside him as he comes, his face near Brett’s throat, groaning and pushing his hips into Brett’s body as hard as he can. Brett strokes his back, eyes shut, revelling in the feeling of Liam twitching with his release inside him.

It takes Liam almost thirty seconds before he stops thrusting and settles against Brett’s body, shaking hard. Brett rubs his back gently, letting his heart rate go back to normal as he listens to Liam breathe. He sounds out of breath.

He grins to himself. “Now who’s the old man?” he breathes to Liam.

There’s a moment of silence; Liam nuzzles his chest. “Fuck you,” he mumbles sleepily.

“Hey.” Brett shifts. “Don’t go to sleep there. You gotta pull out.”

“Mfhm,” Liam whines.

“That’s not a word,” Brett teases. He almost laughs when Liam rises back up onto his hands and knees, exaggeratedly tired, and then reaches down. Brett feels Liam shift inside him - he’s still sort of hard - and then slip out slowly.

Brett winces a little. Liam notices, because the playful expression is gone from his face; he looks concerned. “Did I hurt you?”

“No.” Brett stretches out with his hands behind his head, smiling at Liam drowsily. “That was great. Thank you.”

Liam’s blushing. Brett can’t believe it’s possible to make Liam blush less than five minutes after he’s given Brett some of the best sex of his life.

“Come here,” Brett says.

Liam comes back to him, and Brett leans up to kiss him. Liam humours him, doesn’t force him to keep his head up - he leans down properly and they stay like that for a while, kissing lazily, with Liam’s hand playing idly across Brett’s thigh and Brett’s hand on Liam’s lower back.

Eventually, the sweat on their skin cools; Liam’s the first to shiver, letting it ripple up his spine and causing Brett to do the same. Liam leans back slowly, reluctantly.

“I’m gonna go get a towel,” Liam says shyly.

“Okay,” Brett yawns.

Liam gets off the bed, and Brett listens to him pad away, down the hall. A few minutes later, he’s back with a wet cloth and a smile.

“Here.”

He cleans Brett up. Brett’s legs are still shaking so he’s thankful for that. Liam’s gentle down there, making sure to clean up all the lube and fluid, being careful not to hurt him. Brett appreciates that too.

When they’re clean, Liam gets them both into boxers - grumbling as Brett refuses to cooperate properly, just for the fun of watching Liam struggle - and then settles down, back between Brett’s hips, and stares down at him. He’s on his elbows, and his face is almost close enough to kiss, so Brett lifts his head a little and plants one on Liam’s chin.

Liam smiles. It doesn’t quite reach his eyes. In fact, his eyes look… a little red? If Brett didn’t know better, he’d say Liam looks teary.

“Hey,” Brett says softly.

Liam swallows. “Hi,” he replies, his voice breaking a little over the word.

Liam’s never been emotional after sex before; Brett’s a little worried, uses one hand to grip Liam’s waist soothingly. He raises his other to Liam’s face, using his thumb to stroke Liam’s cheek.

“What’re you thinking about?” he murmurs, scanning Liam’s eyes. They’re wet, and even as Brett watches, a tear rolls out of the left one and makes its slow, lonely descent down Liam’s cheek.

“Liam?” he whispers, startled. “Are you okay?”

Liam blinks again. “I love you,” he says, his voice trembling.

The confession hits Brett like a wave, stealing whatever breath he had left and leaving him disoriented. Liam’s watching him, maybe waiting for a response, maybe gauging his reaction. And Brett’s helpless - speechless.

“I love you,” Liam repeats - his voice is stronger this time, and he leans down to press his forehead against Brett’s. His eyelashes are wet. “You don’t have to say it back. I just wanted you to know. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before. I should have.”

Brett lets his fingers skim Liam’s neck - his collarbones, moving up to the hollow at the base of his throat, the tendons in his neck, the twin jugular veins on either side. He sweeps up to the underside of Liam’s jaw and presses his thumbs into the soft, delicate spot behind Liam’s ears, feels him shiver helplessly, like a frightened animal.

When he looks into Liam’s eyes, though, there’s no part of him that’s frightened. He’s resolute. There’s no doubt there. He means what he said. Brett can see it on his face. Until Brett says something, Liam’s completely at his mercy, and Liam willingly put himself in that position.

“I love you too,” Brett says, his voice sure in the empty air.

Liam sags against his body, his expression crumbling into relief before he leans down and kisses Brett deeply. If there’s any space between them, he can’t feel it; he feels like Liam’s body is his own, like the extensive roadmaps of veins and arteries and capillaries are joined at every point they touch, like it’s the endless beat of Liam’s heart keeping him alive and not his own.

“Why didn’t you tell me when I was being put under?” Brett breathes.

Liam pulls away to look at him - he’s still red-eyed, like he could cry again at any moment. “I didn’t want it to be a deathbed confession,” he says. “I wanted it to be real. I wanted you to know I meant it when I said it.”

Maybe he didn’t give Liam enough credit. So Liam might not know how he feels about himself, or about any of the people around him, or about anything that’s happened to him - anything he’s had to do. But he clearly knows how he feels about Brett - and, if the thought he put into saying it is any indication, knows that the timing was pretty important to Brett feeling the weight of the words.

He runs his fingertips slowly up and down Liam’s spine. There are thirty-three vertebra in any human spine; only eighteen of Liam’s are touchable, and Brett makes sure to count every single one, a few dozen times over, as he runs his hand up and down. They’re evenly aligned, evenly spaced - perfect. A chiropractor’s dream spinal cord.

Liam relaxes against him, impossibly trusting. Brett listens to his breathing, counts the time between inhales, feels the light puffs of air against his neck. He lets his hand drift down to where the scar on Liam’s side is - the only mark marring his otherwise perfect skin. He traces it, lightly, feeling the shivers that ripple up Liam’s torso with the motion.

It’s not big. Maybe half the size of his thumb, straight across. Brett still sometimes finds himself in utter disbelief that Liam didn’t die that day - or the day after that, or the day after that. It was the closest he’s come, that’s for sure.

Brett tightens the arm he has around Liam’s waist. Never again.

“Liam,” Brett says softly.

“Hmm?”

Brett closes his eyes, smiling. “I’m really happy I went through Ashburton last winter.”

Liam doesn’t answer, but Brett feels him grin against his neck, warm and inviting.

“I love you,” Brett says, just to taste the words on his tongue again. He swears he feels Liam’s heart jump against his chest excitedly.

“I love you too.”

~*~

The next day is surreal.

Brett wakes up to Liam, lying on his side, facing Brett, his skin smooth and glowing with the morning light. Brett’s heart trips over itself as he remembers the night before; how gentle Liam was with him, and how good he made Brett feel, and…

_I love you._

He smiles at Liam’s sleeping face and reaches out to stroke his hair - still long. Liam shifts underneath him, tiredly, then opens his eyes.

He smiles sleepily at Brett. “Mornin’.”

“Morning, Li.”

“How long have you been awake?”

“About thirty seconds.”

Liam yawns. “Oh.” He rolls, pushes his hair out of his face. “Can you cut this for me today?”

“Sure.”

That’s what they do, first thing, even before breakfast: Brett gets the scissors and their battery-operated clippers and gets to work on Liam’s hair, cutting and shearing until there’s a little blonde pile on the ground, and Liam’s sufficiently spiky again. Brett’s done this a few times now, and he takes special care not to mess up or cut Liam’s ears or scalp.

He grins up at Brett. “I don’t have to push it out of my face anymore.”

Brett runs his hand over the chaotic spikes. “Looks good,” he says fondly. It looks sort of like some dynamite got set off in it, but Brett likes it like this. It’s familiar to him.

“Did you really wait this whole time?” Brett asks.

“Yep.” Liam hops off his stool and begins sweeping up the remnants of his hair.

“What if I’d never woken up?”

Liam stiffens momentarily, and Brett realises belatedly that that’s probably still a really painful subject for Liam - until Liam gives a weird, forced laugh and says, “Guess I would’ve been like fucking Rapunzel or some shit.”

They don’t do much that day. Brett reads; Liam lies on his lap and falls asleep with Brett’s hand stroking his newly-shorn hair. They play with Fudge. Savannah and her dad come around and he’s proudly presented with his magic charm - which, true to Savannah’s word, matches Liam’s perfectly.

They go to bed. Liam’s on top of him before Brett can be on top of Liam, and Liam’s working his way down Brett’s body and then giving him some of the best head Brett’s ever gotten. He comes in Liam’s mouth and has Liam roll up between his legs so that he can return the favour - jerks Liam off so slow he’s eventually writhing and begging in Brett’s grip. Brett lets him come after fifteen minutes or so.

It’s a pretty peaceful night, all things considered. So Brett’s not expecting to wake up because Liam’s crying out in his sleep.

He’s awake and alert immediately, heart pounding and a nervous sweat breaking out across his body - he rolls over and finds Liam sitting up, panting like he’s run a marathon, drenched in a cold, sticky sweat.

“Liam?” he asks, uncertain if Liam might immediately dissociate. He hates feeling like this - Liam’s changed over six weeks and Brett doesn’t know what he’s likely to do anymore.

Liam lies back down - he’s shaking as he lifts his hands to his face and rubs it a little. His chest is heaving. “Sorry,” he says into the darkness. “Nightmare.”

Brett nods. “You okay?” he asks quietly.

“Yeah.” Liam’s still visibly shaking though.

“What was it?” The bite? The time Brett was out? Garrett?

“The Keeper,” Liam murmurs. “I haven’t had a nightmare about him since the first week you were unconscious.” He sits up and kicks the covers back. “I’m gonna go get a drink.”

He’s gone before Brett can say anything else. Brett hesitates, but ultimately, he follows Liam out of bed - he goes to the bathroom and washes his face first, but then he heads out into the kitchen, intent on… well, he’s not sure what, exactly.

Liam’s standing at the counter, his hand wrapped around a glass of water. He smiles shakily at Brett when Brett enters - he looks spooked, but not like he’s about to have an emotional meltdown, which is a huge stride forward.

Brett rounds the counter, relieved when Liam’s body turns towards him of its own accord. He wraps his arms around Liam’s waist gently, leaning down to rest his head on Liam’s shoulder. Liam’s still kind of sticky from the nightmare sweat, but Brett doesn’t mind. Maybe they can get into a shower together.

“It was just a dream,” Brett says softly.

“I know.” Liam’s fingers tighten gratefully in his shirt, though. “Sorry I woke you up.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

They stand like that for a little while. Brett listens as Liam’s breathing goes back to normal, and his skin cools down from the sweat. He doesn’t make to move away though; he usually lets Liam break their hugs. Even if it does hurt his back to be curled over like this.

Finally, after a few minutes, Liam steps away from him and smiles a little. “I’m gonna finish my water.”

“Good plan.” Liam doesn’t usually drink in the middle of the night. “Why’d you come out here anyway? Usually you roll over and go back to sleep.”

“Oh. Tamara told me that drinking a glass of cold water can help you calm down. Either before an episode or after. I’ve been trying to do that instead of, you know, lying there in the dark and freaking the fuck out.”

“That’s a good idea.” Brett isn’t sure why he feels so strange, only that he does and it’s immensely confusing; Liam’s routines have changed, and he feels a little disoriented by it. At least Liam doesn’t seem to think it’s odd that he’s asking so many questions.

They stand there while Liam drinks his water, barely a few inches apart. Brett stares down at the top of Liam’s head - his hair is freshly spiky and sticking up chaotically, in all directions. He smiles as he runs a hand through it to try and smooth it down.

“Back to normal,” Liam says. Brett’s confused until he realises Liam must be referring to his hair.

“Yeah. I like it spiky. I liked it before too, but…” _This is familiar. Recognisable._ “You wanna take a shower together?”

“Mhm,” Liam agrees.

Brett goes and gets it started. They have better access to hot water and lighting now - the sun is out more often and less likely to be obscured by clouds, and that means the solar panels are generating more electricity. So their shower can actually be warm - even at this time of night.

He steps in, and a minute later, Liam appears. He starts stripping down, not that it takes very long, and then gets in the shower.

Brett runs his hands over the swell of Liam’s shoulders, down the lines of his biceps and triceps. “You on steroids or something?” he asks, and Liam laughs. “Seriously, I don’t think I noticed before but - you’ve gained heaps of muscle.”

Liam smiles. “I uh, I started working out more. While you were out. And I was building things for people too.”

“Like?”

“I built a cubby house for Savannah.” Liam shrugs. “Nobody would let me do anything or leave their sight, and when I told James, he basically gave me a fuckload of wood and tools, asked me to babysit Savannah, and said she’d wanted a cubbyhouse for ages.” Liam shakes his head. “Savannah was babysitting me, I get that now. Like, they might’ve thought I’d hurt myself, but they knew I wouldn’t do it in front of a kid, you know?”

Brett feels a whirlwind of emotions in that moment. He’s grateful to the people who kept Liam occupied and sad that it was necessary and a little mad that they weren’t more aware of Liam’s perceptiveness. Of course Liam would have known exactly what was happening.

“Don’t be mad,” Liam says softly, tilting his head back to look at Brett. “I’m glad they did what they did.”

Brett supposes he should be too. Grateful that they cared enough about Liam to make sure he didn’t get the opportunity to hurt himself - deliberately or otherwise.

He squirts some shampoo onto his hand, then begins working it through Liam’s hair. Liam sighs softly, contentedly, leaning forward and not even questioning why Brett might be washing his hair at this time of night.

“They cleared the zombies.” Liam’s voice is soft; he’s been lulled into near sleep by Brett’s ministrations. “And made a vaccine. But the scouting teams were decimated. I had to go out with April.”

“April?” Brett demands. “Whose idea was-”

“Hers. It was fine. She apologised. Besides, there weren’t many healthy people. We went out and I hunted down a few deer.” Liam opens his eyes and smiles sleepily. “You gonna be mad at every person I came into contact with?”

“Maybe,” Brett huffs, then fights back a smile of his own as Liam gets shampoo in his eye and starts spluttering.

Liam has two more nightmares that night. Both times, he awakens sweating - not as much as before, but enough - and drags himself out of bed to get a glass of water. Brett listens to him move from where he’s lying, and when Liam comes back, he spoons up to his back and holds him until Liam’s warm again.

“I’m probably gonna wake up again,” Liam mumbles. “You don’t have to-”

“It’s okay,” Brett interrupts. “I like holding you.”

Liam shifts in his arms. “Okay,” he murmurs. “If you’re sure.”

Brett’s sure. Liam finally drops off again, and when Brett wakes next, it’s because the sun has risen. Liam’s dead asleep, and he had a rough night, so Brett lets him rest. He moves out from under Liam’s body gently, then heads to the kitchen.

It looks like it’s going to be a nice day. He looks down at Fudge - who has followed him out and is staring at him eagerly, obviously hoping for breakfast - and thinks that maybe he and Liam could take the dog for a walk.

He gets Fudge’s breakfast and makes some of his own. When he touches his mug - hot, with boiling water in it -the heel of his hand feels absolutely nothing. Brett could probably stab it with a knife and still only know if he saw it happen.

“Morning.”

He turns around; Liam’s padded sleepily out into the kitchen. He looks exhausted - there are bags under his eyes, and he’s rubbing at his right one sleepily. Still, he gives Brett a small smile as he walks in.

“Hi.” Brett scoots back a little, and Liam comes over to him, slumps down into his lap with his arm around Brett’s shoulders. He leans on Brett trustingly, his eyes closed, and yawns.

Brett wraps his arms around Liam’s waist. “Rough night?” he asks softly.

Liam nods.

“You wanna talk about it?”

“Not right now.” Liam sounds tired just at the prospect of it; he sits still on Brett’s lap as Brett eats, and Brett’s not surprised when Liam’s breathing starts to get deeper and slower. He’s falling asleep where he’s sitting.

_Maybe I should’ve stayed in bed with him_ , Brett thinks guiltily, tightening his arms around Liam’s waist. _It probably wasn’t nice to wake up alone after having nightmares all night._

“You wanna go back to bed?” Brett asks kindly.

“I’m okay.” Liam yawns. “Just sleepy.”

“Yeah, I can tell.” He doesn’t say anything else; Liam seems content to sit on his lap and doze, and Brett’s happy to let him, even if his legs are going to sleep.

Liam shifts and yawns a little. “I have to go out today,” he says.

“Scouting?” Brett asks.

Liam shakes his head as he begins to stand up. “Wall patrols.”

“Wall patrols?” Brett asks. “Why?”

“They’ve scaled back scouting until there are more people able to go and not get killed,” Liam says, climbing off his lap. “They still need competent people on the walls, though. They’ve only been sending me on scouting trips that are specifically for hunting.”

Brett nods. They’re not willing to risk Liam’s life out there - but he is the most skilled hunter they have. A few people have told him about Liam bringing home three deer in one day. _Kira’s right_ , he thinks, watching as Liam leaves to get dressed. _He pulled through because people needed him._

He stands up and follows Liam into the bedroom. He’s got his boxers on, but he’s shirtless; Brett watches the muscles in his back and shoulders move with every movement. When he notices Brett’s there, he turns and smiles.

“What?” he asks.

“Nothing. You look good.”

Liam looks down, blushing, but still sort of smiling. “I’ll never be as big as you,” he says, but he seems pleased with the compliment.

“You’ve got a totally different body type to me,” Brett says, running his hands down Liam’s sides and kissing the back of his neck. “Not that that matters. You’re built like a fucking tank.” Liam is right; Brett’s got a wide chest and wide shoulders, a relatively narrow waist, hips, and legs. Liam’s almost straight up and down, but still carrying almost the same amount of muscle.

“Thanks. I think.” Liam cracks his back. “I’m gonna have a shower,” he yawns.

“It’ll be a cold one.”

“Don’t care.”

Brett heads back out into the kitchen - he doesn’t want a cold shower, damn it - and sits down on the couch with a book. Fudge looks to the bathroom, where Brett can hear water running, and to Brett, on the couch, before whining miserably and settling down halfway between the two.

Brett smiles. “Don’t like it when we’re in different places, huh, buddy?”

Fudge huffs.

Brett’s only read a couple of pages of his book before there’s a knock at the front door. With Liam in the shower, he gets up to answer it, finding Sheriff Stilinski on the other side.

“Hi,” he says.

“Hi, Brett. Feeling better?”

“Much,” Brett says - which is truthful. He’s glad to be out of the hospital, unhooked from all the wires and tubes and electrodes. “Thanks. What’s up?”

“Is Liam around?”

Brett gestures with his thumb. “Shower. Want me to grab him?”

“If you could,” Sheriff Stilinski says. He looks tired, rubs his face a little, and then says, “We need both of you down at the town hall as soon as possible.”

“Okay. Liam has a wall patrol shift, though, so-”

“We’ve cancelled it.”

Something’s going on, Brett realises. Something big.

~*~

“So uh… whatever it is you think I’ve done, I haven’t,” Liam says sheepishly.

Mrs. McCall smiles as Brett and Liam settle into chairs. “You haven’t done anything, sweetie,” she says kindly.

“Oh good.”

The whole council, barring Logan, is here, Brett realises. “What’s going on?” he asks slowly.

There’s a long pause. Then Sheriff Stilinski leans forward and says, “We’re sending you to DC.”

Brett looks at Liam, feeling alarmed - Liam feels the same way, judging by his expression. “DC?” he demands. “Why?”

“The last thing anyone heard was that a few scientists in DC were trying to make a cure,” Tamara says softly. “Your blood has antibodies after the bite - the levels have held consistently steady since you started to produce them, and there’s no reason to believe they’ll stop. You could be the cure, Brett.”

“No pressure,” Brett says weakly. “Aren’t there others?”

“Unconfirmed cases, yes, in South Africa,” Tamara says. “But we only know of you for sure.”

There’s a long silence. Then Brett says, “Okay. You’re sending me to DC. Why’s Liam here, then?”

“Liam’s going with you,” Mrs. McCall says.

Liam lifts his head, suddenly paying attention. “Liam’s going with me?” Brett demands. “Look, I’m definitely not opposed to that-” Except he sort of is; Liam’s safer here - “but he’s the most skilled hunter you have, and-”

“Brett, Logan wants to send Liam to Ashburton on a four-person scouting team,” Tamara interrupts. “He’s been trying to get us to agree to it for months now. You know as well as we do that it’s a suicide mission.”

“Logan’s the leader,” Brett says quietly. “You have to do what he says, right?”

“We can’t send Liam to Ashburton if he’s not here to send,” Sheriff Stilinski says. “If he were to say… defect from here, there would be no way of finding him. The mission would get called off. He can’t do it without Liam’s knowledge of the area.”

Brett stares at them. They really are doing everything they can to protect Liam, he realises. None of them are willing to sell him out to save themselves or anyone else.

“There is a problem,” Mr. Yukimura says. “With Logan around, even knowing what he’s done, we can’t send you. He won’t authorise it and we’re worried he’ll simply kill you - or Liam - to prevent you leaving. We need him gone before anything can be done.”

“Okay.” Brett rubs his face. “I don’t have a choice, I understand that, and I’m… well, I’m not happy to go, but I’m willing. What about Liam? Does he get a choice?”

“Liam can do what he wants,” Sheriff Stilinski says. “He’s an adult now.”

“I’m going,” Liam says immediately.

“Liam-”

“Shut up, I’m going,” Liam snaps at him. “You really think I’m gonna let you go off on your own?”

“And you will be on your own,” Tamara adds quickly. “We can’t afford to send anyone else with you, boys. There aren’t enough scouts as it is. It’ll be just you two out there.”

Brett feels scared at the prospect, but Liam gives the council a small smile and says, “That’s okay. That’s how it was before. We’ll manage.”

_Liam’s so much braver than I am_ , Brett thinks, feeling almost dizzy with fright. River’s End isn’t Oakridge, but it’s safe, they have friends here, food, shelter-

“We’ll keep you updated,” Sheriff Stilinski says. “Until then, you’re pretty much free to go.”

They pick up and leave after that; Liam’s really quiet beside him, hands shoved in his pockets as they begin the walk home.

“Liam,” Brett says quietly.

“Don’t say it. I’m going.”

“You don’t-”

“Yes I do.” Liam turns to him. “Remember what I said a while ago? I’d follow you anywhere.” He smiles a little. “Especially now.”

“I don’t want you to die,” Brett says.

“And I don’t want you to die,” Liam replies, arching an eyebrow. “And we’re less likely to die if we’re together. So I’m going. Besides, you heard what they said - Logan’s gonna send me to Ashburton if I don’t go, and I’d really rather not go back there.”

“It’s not safe out there,” Brett pleads.

“Yeah? It’s not safe here either. Not with Logan around. I’m safer with you than anywhere else.”

Brett rubs his face. He feels stressed, tired - exhausted just by the idea of having to get to DC, knowing that by the time they do, it’ll be pretty much winter and cold again and last winter was hard enough, and-

Liam takes his hand, the bitten one. “We’ll do it together,” he promises quietly.

“Yeah.” Brett swallows. “Okay.”


	25. Chapter Twenty Five - Animus Nocendi

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mehhh I'm sorry this chapter is sorta crappy guys, it's one of those "gotta get 'em from A to B" kinda things. Hopefully it clears up some of the stuff concerning Logan (more on that in the next chapter too)
> 
> Trigger warnings: mentions of attempted rape, medical scenarios, I think that about covers it?
> 
> Still gonna be on tumblr hiatus but I felt bad for not posting so I cleaned this up and finished it and tadaa
> 
> Enjoy!

**Chapter Twenty Five - Animus Nocendi**

Brett wakes up with his heart pounding in his chest, the remnants of a cry on his tongue.

Liam’s sitting up, next to him, looking thoroughly freaked out. “Are you okay?” he breathes. “Are you-”

Brett rubs his face. He’s trembling violently; is this how Liam feels after every nightmare? Like his skin isn’t made for him and he could easily lose himself to the violent images inside his head? He hopes not.

“Nightmare,” Brett breathes.

“Oh.” Liam slides out of bed. “Wait here.”

Brett waits, trying to convince his heart to slow down. Leaving River’s End means leaving safety - and Liam has been safe here. He’s healed from his injuries and he’s grown and seems happier and healthier than he was before. Can they really leave? Can Brett really expect Liam to follow him? He doesn’t know.

Liam pads back into the room, holding a tall cup. “Here,” he says with a small smile. “Try and drink it slowly. It helps.”

Brett takes the cup and begins drinking - slowly, like Liam instructed - as Liam climbs back into bed and pulls one of the blankets around his shoulders, sitting cross-legged on the mattress. The air is chilly, still - the days might be warming up but the nights are still cold, and Liam’s only wearing a thin cotton t-shirt and boxers.

Brett’s heart rate slows. Liam’s sitting right next to him and he’s fine. He’s yawning sleepily, his eyes half-shut and his nose twitching as he sniffles a bit, but he’s fine. That Keeper never did get to finish what he started. That part was just Brett’s imagination.

He finishes the water. Liam smiles at him.

“Better?”

It actually is. He feels much calmer as he leans over and puts the cup on his bedside table. When he turns around, Liam’s looking at him.

“What’d you dream about?” he asks softly.

Brett closes his eyes. “Nothing good.”

“You said my name. A few times.”

Brett swallows thickly. “I was just… that Keeper… in Ashburton. I’ve never really had nightmares before, but… we’re leaving here, and out there… that’s where they are, Liam.”

Liam’s face softens. “We aren’t safe anywhere, you know,” he says softly. “This is just an illusion. Something’s gonna come for us eventually.” He shrugs. “Whether it’s in here, or out there, something’s gonna come for us. For everyone.”

It’s morbid, but it’s the truth.

“Do you still dream about it?” Brett asks.

Liam nods. “Sometimes. Not that often anymore. When I do, it’s usually just like… oh, this again.”

“Really?” Brett murmurs.

Liam meets his eyes. “Worse things have happened since,” he says quietly.

 _Would my death really have been worse for you than almost being raped?_ Brett wonders, but when Liam looks down at his hands and swallows thickly, Brett realises - _yes. It would have been._

Brett shuffles closer and wraps his arms around Liam’s waist, putting his head on Liam’s shoulder. His cheeks are soft - he’s just shaven, probably only a few hours before they went to bed - and his hair is soft where it brushes Brett’s temples. He smells like sleep and blackcurrant, which is probably because of the really girly soaps the scouting teams have been lifting from Bath and Body works.

“Well,” Brett says. “They’re over now, right?”

“Right,” Liam says softly, and turns his head to kiss Brett’s neck. “We should go back to sleep. I’m on wall patrol tomorrow, then they’re sending us on a scouting mission at dawn.”

“Working you hard, huh?” Brett murmurs as they lie down.

Liam shrugs. “Making up for lost labour I guess. I didn’t do much while you were out.”

“I doubt anyone expected you to.” Brett folds Liam into his arms gently, pressing his lips against Liam’s forehead and smoothing a hand up his waist. “You probably needed the rest anyway.”

“Mm, it was nice, but I’m glad I’m doing stuff again now.” Liam’s fingers skate over Brett’s hand, and he tracks the movement right up until the sensation disappears. “Can you feel that?”

“Feel what?”

“I’m pinching you.”

“Can’t feel a thing,” Brett admits. He looks down as Liam releases the skin - it’s stayed pale and bloodless, and the skin takes a while to snap back to normal. He shudders. “Does it freak you out?”

“Hmm, no,” Liam murmurs sleepily. “It’s a part of you just like everything else.”

“You say really sweet things when you’re sleepy,” Brett says, partly teasing.

Liam smiles at him drowsily. “I try. Sometimes. Not very hard.”

Brett laughs a little. “C'mon, we should get some rest. Gotta make sure you can function out in the big bad world.”

Liam yawns and leans up to give him a kiss on the mouth, soft and drowsy like the rest of him. “G'night,” he murmurs.

“Night, Li.”

~*~

It’s warm when Brett wakes up.

The sun is filtering through the window above the bed, and the first thing he sees is Liam’s long, bare, solid back, spread out before him like an endless, smooth plain of light-gold sand.

He smiles sleepily, runs his hand up Liam’s left side. Liam’s got his torso and arms pitched away from Brett - probably because it’s warm - and his arms are tucked beneath the pillow. He’s facing away from Brett; the most he can see is the shell of Liam’s left ear.

They are, however, touching at the hips and legs; Brett realises he’s pressed firmly up against Liam’s ass, and that he’s hard. He rubs his eyes a little, groans, and ruts up slightly.

Liam pushes back against him, then down into the mattress. Brett smiles a little, rubs Liam’s back again. “What happened to your shirt, baby?”

“I took it off.” Liam’s voice is low and raspy from residual sleepiness. “It was too hot.”

Brett looks at their feet; Liam has kicked off all the blankets, all four of them. “You could start sleeping with less blankets,” he suggests.

Liam peers at him drowsily, over his shoulder. “You want me to put a shirt on?”

“I never said that,” Brett retorts, grinning as he snakes a hand around to Liam’s dick. He’s hard inside his boxers, and he gives a soft whine when Brett palms at him through them.

“Good?” Brett asks.

“Mmf,” Liam mumbles into the pillow. “Don’t start something you can’t finish.”

“I fully intend on finishing it,” Brett murmurs, and lets Liam’s erection go to tug his boxers down. Liam shivers, but he stays where he is, barely flicking his eyes over his shoulder at Brett before relaxing.

Brett grabs the bottle of lube and gets some on his fingers, presses lightly at Liam’s entrance. Liam whines softly and arches up.

Brett smiles. “Stay still,” he commands gently. “I’m gonna take care of you.” With that, he presses his finger in, smoothing his hand up Liam’s back. He listens to Liam’s breathy little exhale, watches as he melts against the mattress. His eyes are shut; he tucks his arms beneath his head.

He fingers Liam for a little while, watching as the shaking gets more and more pronounced - eventually, he slips a second finger in, and the muscles in Liam’s back and sides tighten impossibly. He’s chewing on his lip, and Brett looks around to see Liam’s cock leaking onto the sheets beneath him.

Now that he’s been on the receiving end, it’s infinitely easier to locate Liam’s prostate - once he’s found it, he presses, watching as Liam melts against the bed and finally gives up on staying silent; he moans loudly.

“I love it when you make noise,” Brett murmurs, pressing Liam’s prostate again. “It’s awesome. Tells me I’m doing a good job.”

“Oh, Jesus,” Liam whimpers. “What’re you doing?”

He’s consistently targeting the little bundle of nerves inside Liam, that’s what he’s doing - he knows how pleasurable they feel now, and imagines the rippling, tingling sensation that must be running down Liam’s lower back, through his thighs, the heat that’s probably curling in his belly…

“Brett,” Liam pants. “Brett, Brett, stop - stop-”

Brett stops, alarmed, and Liam sags down, gasping for air. “Sorry,” he whispers. “Did I hurt you?”

“No,” Liam moans, shuddering. “I was gonna come.”

“That was the whole point, Liam,” Brett teases.

“Nnh, I want you to fuck me,” Liam mumbles into the pillow. “Please?”

Brett’s mouth goes dry; something about Liam asking nicely does all sorts of weird things to him. “Okay,” he murmurs. “But… I wanna make you come first.”

“Hm?” Liam asks, turning to look at Brett over his shoulder. “Why? If you do that-”

“Liam, your refractory period is ridiculously short,” Brett points out. “I can make you come now and you’ll be ready again in less than ten minutes.”

“Okay,” Liam breathes. “But can you go a little slower?”

“Sure.” He starts off with one finger again, then two; he continues what he was doing before, but more slowly, watching Liam’s face. He’s relaxed, mouth open and eyes shut, rutting lightly against the bed.

Brett puts his hand on Liam’s hip - admires how big his palm looks against the bone - and pulls Liam until he’s got no friction from the bed. Liam shoots him a look over his shoulder, but he stays still, even though it looks monumentally difficult.

“I’ve never come twice in one session,” Liam breathes. Brett’s surprised when Liam’s hand reaches back and covers Brett’s, still on Liam’s hip - Liam’s never been particularly concerned with hand holding, inside the bedroom or out.

“If you don’t, that’s okay,” Brett murmurs. “And if you want me to stop after you’re finished I will.”

Liam tugs his hand around and puts it on his dick; Brett takes the hint. Liam wants Brett to touch him. “Okay,” he pants. “Fuck, that’s so - that’s so intense.”

“Good?” He angles slightly, thrusts with his fingers a little harder; Liam’s mouth drops open in a desperate, needy moan.

“Fuck,” Liam breathes. “Yeah.”

Brett tightens his grip on Liam’s cock, and Liam whimpers, pushing his hips forward. He stutters on the movement, like he’s not sure which way he wants to go - towards Brett’s fingers inside him, or into his hand.

Brett strokes him gently, finds his prostate again, and nudges it. Liam’s dick blurts a stream of precome out. He’s breathing like a racehorse already, his hand clenched into the sheets underneath him, shoulders and back tight as he strains.

“Brett…”

“Yeah, I know, I’ve got you. This good?”

“Yeah.”

“You gonna come soon?”

“Really soon,” Liam chokes. “Oh, God.”

“Okay.” Brett thrusts a little harder, squeezes Liam’s dick - he feels Liam’s muscles flutter anxiously around his fingers, and he says, “Come for me.”

Liam spurts all over Brett’s hand and the sheets - his knuckles are white, and he’s got a handful of the sheets twisted up, and he’s rolling his hips and pressing his face into the pillow. Brett watches, stunned, rock hard and leaking inside his own boxers. That looked really fucking intense - it still looks intense, and Liam’s still shuddering violently, his hips moving as he wrings the last of his orgasm into Brett’s hand.

“Oh my God,” Liam moans.

“Good?”

“Yes,” Liam groans. He’s still trying to catch his breath. “Fuck. When the hell did you learn how to do that? You’ve been holding out on me.”

Brett laughs. “Guess I got some perspective after you fucked me.”

Liam looks at him. “Speaking of which,” he croaks, “are you still gonna?”

“Only if you want me to,” Brett says softly.

“Mm, yeah.” Liam closes his eyes, licks his lips. “Just… give me a couple of minutes. If you fuck me right now I’ll cry.”

Something about that has alarm bells ringing in Brett’s head. Liam doesn’t say it jokingly; he says it like it’s happened before, often enough that he knows it isn’t a coincidence when it does. But he’s not going to ask right now. Liam usually volunteers that sort of information anyway.

Instead, he pulls out, cleans off his fingers, and begins massaging Liam’s shoulders. The left one clicks; Liam groans, slightly uncomfortably, as Brett targets the knot he can feel beneath the shoulder blade and starts assaulting it with his thumb.

“Oww,” Liam moans.

“Sorry,” Brett murmurs. “Jesus, you’re tense.”

“Guess you’d better fuck it out of me,” Liam says, grinning over his shoulder. He’s lying pretty much the same way he was when Brett woke up: on his stomach, one leg raised, hands tucked beneath his head. Brett smiles, admiring the tiny little bit of squish on Liam’s belly, reaches around to stroke it.

“Mm, don’t play with my rolls,” Liam complains, but he doesn’t move.

“Rolls?” Brett asks. “You don’t have rolls. I think it’s cute. I like it.” And it suggests that Liam’s been eating well - that he has enough to eat. He’s seen Liam frighteningly thin before, with his collarbones jutting and ribs showing with every inhale. Brett’s built long and lean like a greyhound, and it’s only years in the gym that have gotten him to the size he is now - Liam, on the other hand, is definitely more of a bulldog, short and naturally muscular, with a little more natural fat on him.

“I was a chubby kid,” Liam mumbles. “Did I ever tell you that?”

“No.”

“I was. I looked like a guinea pig.”

Brett laughs, watches Liam’s mouth curve up into a happy smile. “I did,” he insists. “Short legs, chubby, buck teeth.”

“Buck teeth? You have fucking beautiful teeth. I mean, I’m biased, but-”

“I had braces.” Liam turns suddenly, lifts his head, and opens his mouth - there’s metal running along the backs of his teeth. “I’m supposed to wear a retainer.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. It’s, you know, it’s not on my list of things to do, though. You know? Kill zombies, find enough food to eat, survive the winter, don’t get hurt or sick, wear my retainer every night.”

Brett laughs again. “I’ll find you a retainer.”

“Fuck no, I hate those things. They fucking hurt my mouth. And I need my mouth for other things.”

“Like eating?” Brett asks innocently.

Liam rolls his eyes, and Brett smiles before giving up on Liam’s shoulder - which he’s been massaging absently - and pressing against Liam’s entrance again.

Liam’s breath catches, and he shivers, but when Brett pauses, he turns and says, “C'mon, what’re you waiting for?” and Brett dips in. Liam’s still loose and pliant under his hand; he works around for a little while, trying to avoid Liam’s prostate and nudging a third finger in.

By the time he’s done seriously prepping Liam, Liam’s cock is sort of starting to go hard again, like it really wants to be interested. Brett checks with Liam again, makes sure this is okay, before slicking himself up.

“You okay like this?”

“Mmhm. That angle’s really fucking good.”

“Okay.” He pauses. “Condom?”

“Nah. Bit late if either of us have something, right?”

“True. Your mother wouldn’t like you having unprotected sex.”

“Oh please, like any damn case of the cooties is going to kill me. It’ll be something else, like being bitten, or other people, or - oh, God.”

Brett grins; he’s pushing slowly to enter Liam, and Liam’s sinking forward, biting his lip. “God isn’t going to kill you,” Brett says.

“Depends on who you’re asking,” Liam pants. “I’m sure if-”

Brett leans over and manages to catch Liam’s mouth in a kiss, effectively silencing him as he continues to enter Liam slowly. Liam’s breathing hard, and he’s twitching around Brett’s dick - apparently still sensitive. Not that Brett can exactly blame him for that.

He slides his arm under Liam’s neck and shoulders, tucking his other around Liam’s waist and gripping the spot just beneath his ribs; Liam groans into his mouth as Brett bottoms out.

Liam breaks the kiss. “Gimme a second,” he breathes.

“Sure.” Brett’s not sure how long he can actually stay still; it’s been ages since he was inside Liam, this close to him, feeling him breathe and clench around him.

Liam lets his head drop onto Brett’s arm, apparently trusting Brett to cradle his neck. His mouth is still open, and he finds Brett’s eyes with his own - Brett watches as Liam’s dick twitches on his belly. Liam’s already messy and sweaty, but Brett’s just getting there now.

Brett gives Liam a gentle kiss. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” Liam breathes. “It’s really sensitive.”

“Good or bad?”

“Good. Definitely good.”

Brett switches position a little - Liam rolls until his belly is near the mattress, leg still propped up. Brett curls his torso around Liam’s and reaches down, threads his fingers between Liam’s. Liam’s hand clenches his.

“Since when are you into hand-holding?” Liam mumbles.

“I dunno. You started it.”

“I just wanted you to touch my-”

Brett rubs his thumb over the head of Liam’s dick; Liam stops talking, abruptly, the breath leaving his lungs in a long, desperate gust of air.

“That?” Brett asks, pulling back and thrusting carefully. Liam squirms a little, but he settles down, rolling until he’s almost totally on his stomach.

“Hey,” Brett murmurs. “Tell me if it’s not nice, okay? I’ll stop.”

“It’s nice. I’m just adjusting.”

Brett kisses the back of Liam’s neck, uses his teeth to nibble there a little. He only remembers that this is one of Liam’s erogenous zones when Liam shivers and moans, goosebumps rippling spectacularly down his body - right from his neck to his thighs.

Liam’s muscles flutter around him; he pitches forward a little, and Brett notices that he’s got his fingers knotted into the sheet again. Brett watches the muscles in Liam’s back and shoulders pulse with the movement - sees where his trapezoid muscles give way to his flanks, and eventually the narrowest part of his waist, just before his hips. Brett slides his hand up there; Liam shivers.

Brett rests his forehead between Liam’s shoulders with a groan, thrusting a little harder. “Fuck. You look amazing.”

Liam huffs out a short laugh. “How can you even tell from there?”

“Your back I mean. And your arms.” He runs a hand up Liam’s side, curls it around his shoulder, and down Liam’s arm, admiring how thick and defined his biceps and triceps are. He thrusts again, harder, pauses inside - Liam moans, sounding surprised, and wriggles.

“You okay?”

“Yeah,” Liam breathes, putting his head down. “Just. Really good angle.”

Brett’s going to hazard a guess that “really good angle” is Liam-speak for “you’re really really deep”. His girlfriend always loved this kind of position for exactly that reason; Liam’s probably not much different.

“Not too sensitive?” Brett asks - he’s looked down at Liam’s erection to see him only half-hard.

“No, no, it’s great.” Liam groans as Brett’s hand squeezes his waist, and he starts to thrust a little more regularly. “You just - do your thing,” he pants. “I’ll catch up.”

Noticing that Liam can’t really use his hands - he’s up on his elbows to support his weight, and both his hands are tugging on the sheets - Brett takes Liam in his hand, stroking gently. Liam can come without a hand on his dick, sometimes, but Brett highly doubts he’ll be able to after already having orgasmed once in the last ten minutes.

Liam’s gnawing on his lip; when Brett’s thumb brushes over the head, slowly, he drops his head and mumbles, “Oh, fuck.”

Brett grins; Liam’s getting harder from the attention already. “I love having a teenager for a boyfriend,” he whispers in Liam’s ear, and Liam shivers violently. Brett shifts, slowly - he’s not trying to crush Liam, and he is heavier - until he can get some leverage with his knees.

Liam yanks on the sheet; it drags, but stays precariously snagged on the edge of the mattress. “Oh, fuck,” he says again.

Brett kind of wants to laugh, but this is starting to feel pretty amazing; he strokes Liam carefully and starts to pick up a little but more speed, until Liam’s uttering a near-constant stream of noise beneath him, interrupted only by desperate gasps for air and thick, gulping swallows.

Liam clenches around him, desperately - he’s rock hard in Brett’s grip, and Brett can feel his own orgasm approaching after a few solid minutes of teasing Liam and then fucking him. “Gonna come?” he pants.

“Maybe,” Liam whimpers back.

Brett squeezes; Liam’s hips, which are moving a little - as much as they can - beneath him, stutter, his mouth dropping open. “Oh, God.”

“That sounds good.” Brett picks up the pace, again, feels Liam squeezing tighter and tighter around him, hot and wet and-

“Liam, I’m gonna come,” he groans, unable to stop a few of his own whimpers falling from his lips.

“‘Kay,” Liam croaks back.

Brett only gets in two more thrusts before his orgasm hits and he comes inside Liam, panting into the back of his neck and tugging on Liam’s cock quickly. Liam’s whining vaguely beneath him, and Brett can feel the thick vein on the underside of his dick pulsing fervently - but Liam hasn’t come yet. He usually does when Brett does.

“You struggling?” Brett pants.

“You realise how hard it is to come again this soon?” Liam moans back.

Brett leans down and nibbles on the shell of Liam’s ear; shivers start rocketing up Liam’s neck and body, and Brett can see his nipples hardening with interest. “You can do it,” he murmurs, trying to keep his voice smooth. “I know you can. For me?”

Liam shudders and, to Brett’s surprise, gives a low sob - it’s loud enough that it verges on being a cry - before he’s coming onto the sheets below them, shivering faintly, eyes closed. Brett runs a hand up Liam’s side, unsure if that sob was pleasure or not.

“You okay?”

Liam nods, dropping his face onto the pillow. “Fuck,” he whispers, sounding stunned.

Brett laughs. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. Yeah. Oh, man.” Liam’s panting hard, collapsed in a vaguely trembling pile on the sheets. Brett leans back a little, pulls out - Liam just sighs. Brett squeezes the backs of his thighs, then looks around for a hand towel.

“Jesus, Liam,” he says. “Look what you did to the fucking sheet.”

Liam’s yanked their fitted sheet so hard it’s come free from the corner of the mattress. “Fucking sue me,” he mumbles, his sides still heaving as he drags in air.

“Oh my God,” Brett chuckles. “You sound so tired.”

“I am tired,” Liam mumbles. His face is pressed into the pillow. “Jesus. You try coming twice in twenty minutes.”

Brett doesn’t think he could. He might not be old, but he’s not a teenager anymore either.

“That’s what I thought,” Liam mutters smugly.

“You want me to keep cleaning you up?” Brett asks, waving the cloth threateningly. “Or do you want me to make you walk to the bathroom and clean yourself up?”

Liam smiles over his shoulder. “I can’t walk,” he says. “I can’t feel my legs.”

“Oh, shut up,” Brett mutters, running the rag gently over Liam’s belly and dick. “You’re just trying to flatter me into caring for you.”

“Aaand it’s working,” Liam says, sounding smug all over again.

Brett wants to stop, just to prove a point, but then Liam turns around and smiles at him - genuinely, with no ulterior motive behind it, and Brett sort of forgets what he was even meant to be doing. “I can’t believe you ever needed braces,” he murmurs.

Liam grins. “That’s the idea, right?”

Brett moves to clean Liam up properly, and Liam twitches and shifts away from his hand - only an inch or so before stopping and relaxing again. He sighs lowly as Brett hesitates.

“I-”

“You don’t have to tell me,” Brett says.

“I know. Garrett tried the overstimulation thing a few times. Said he "read about it” or what the fuck ever. Mostly, for me, it was just really, really uncomfortable. Like, not exactly painful, but not nice or anything.“

Brett nods. "Well, I won’t do that.”

“I know.” Liam rolls onto his back when Brett’s done. “Come back,” he whines. “I’m cold.”

Brett smiles, lies down between Liam’s hips, and kisses him deeply. When he pulls back, he admires the planes of Liam’s cheekbones and the soft, full swell of his lips - the light glancing off his eyes, reducing his pupils to pinpricks.

“You know,” Brett says, “I always wanted a guinea pig.”

Liam laughs, covers his face as he blushes. Brett leans down to nibble on his chin, trying to hide his own smile and look totally serious. It’s hard, though, with Liam happy and looking so genuinely carefree underneath him.

Brett grabs them both boxers, and Liam a t-shirt, but Liam shrugs him away in favour of cuddling up to Brett’s chest, a leg slung over his hips. “I’m so glad you’re okay,” he murmurs, tracing the patterns of Brett’s tattoo absently.

Brett’s throat tightens. “Yeah. Me too.”

“I don’t know what I would’ve done without you.”

“Liam…” Brett whispers.

“No, I - c'mon, shut up for a second.” Liam leans up on his arms and gazes down at Brett, his eyes looking a little red. “I really don’t know what I would’ve done. I mean everyone - everyone says oh, he was so _good_ , he was so _brave_ , he really held it together, but that was only because you didn’t actually die. If you had…”

“I didn’t though.” Brett strokes Liam’s spine; he’s breathing kind of hard. “I didn’t. I’m right here-”

“But you could have. And it could still happen.”

“Hey,” Brett soothes. “Hey, listen to me, okay? I’m safe right now.”

“Yeah,” Liam says. “But we’re leaving soon. I’m scared.”

The last time Brett heard Liam admit, out loud, that he was scared, Liam thought he’d been bitten and was in the throes of delirium, induced by fever, closer to death that he’s ever been before or since. It almost stops Brett’s heart to hear it now; he might know Liam’s scared, but Liam never says it.

“I am too,” he murmurs. Liam’s face relaxes a little, like he was worried Brett was going to judge him. “But, Liam… the Milwaukee protocol worked. I have antibodies against the virus now. If there’s a way they can make a cure…” _This could all be over. We could just… go back to Before. No zombies. No running and hiding and panicking. No death._

“I know. I know we have to. I just - I wish it could be different, you know?” Liam looks down; he’s playing with a particular spot of Brett’s tattoo, one that lies directly over his heart. “I wish it didn’t have to be us.”

“It doesn’t have to be _you_ ,” Brett says quietly, even though the thought of travelling alone, without Liam, without a way to contact him, is utterly terrifying. “It can just be me.”

Liam smiles. His eyes are glossy with unshed tears. “Don’t be stupid. I’m going.”

“You don’t have to, you-”

“I do. We’re in this together.” Liam settles against him. “When you had pneumonia, back in Ashburton? I remember thinking at the time, you know, _this stupid asshole came into my city and made himself my problem and now he’s going to fucking die on me. What a prick_. And, you know… You’re not really my problem anymore. You’re just… it’s my job. To take care of you.”

Brett hadn’t realised Liam felt the same need to protect him as Brett does Liam. “I know,” he says. “But you can quit jobs.”

“I don’t quit anything.” Liam nibbles on his lower lip thoughtfully. “Especially not really hot college guys. Even if they are rather inconveniently the only person known to have survived a zombie bite.”

Brett smiles. “Thank you.” He’s grateful for not having to do this alone. Even though he wants Liam safe. Although, he’s starting to realise that the only place he really feels Liam is totally safe is with him. Even if that’s outside. He’s the only person he’s sure won’t trade Liam for anything.

Liam smiles a little. “Hey, you never gave up on me, right? And I gave you plenty of reasons to. Nobody else would’ve risked going to the hospital to get me medicine. And nobody else would’ve known how to get me out of a hole in ice in the middle of winter because I was fucking dumb enough to go out there in the first place. Or…” Liam fidgets with his fingers. “Or tried to understand me when I kept pushing you back. I kind of love you for all that. You’re… pretty much the first.”

Brett’s throat feels tight. He’d sort of surmised all that, just by the way Liam reacts when Brett shows him basic human kindness - especially at the beginning - but it’s different to hear it out loud. “That doesn’t mean you have to sacrifice whatever peace you’ve got just for me,” Brett says.

“You keep saying you and me like we’re on opposite sides,” Liam says. “There is no you and me. Just us.”

Brett feels floored, but Liam continues, seemingly without noticing how choked up Brett us. “We,” he says, emphasizing the word, “are going to go to Washington, find whatever fucking scientists are left, and make a cure. Then we can be hailed as heroes and never have to work again and have lots of sex.”

Brett smiles, feels it wobbling. “I love you.”

“I made you squishy,” Liam says with a little smile. “Sorry. I love you too.”

Brett smiles. He’s never going to get over hearing that, considering he never thought he would. “Okay, okay. Stop turning me into a pile of mush. You have wall patrolling to do.”

“Ugh,” Liam groans. “I hate wall patrolling.”

“I know. Up. C'mon.”

“Dude. It doesn’t work like that. I just came twice, you can’t just tell me to - why’re you laughing?” Liam whines.

“Just go have a shower,” Brett chuckles. “Dork.”

He joins Liam in the shower briefly, kisses him goodbye, and spends some time doing jobs around the house - dishes, laundry, general cleaning. Shit he never, ever though he’d have to do again, let alone actually enjoy.

“You’re not helping,” he grumbles at Fudge, who’s stolen three pairs of socks and keeps coming back for more. “What do you want? Are you bored? Are you hungry? Do you miss Liam? Speak, dog.”

Fudge barks.

“Close enough, I guess. C'mon.” He stands up. “Let’s go out.”

He has to get his blood drawn and checked. It’s part of the routine now - a blood draw, once every three days, to make sure that the virus in his system isn’t multiplying. It’s dead, what with the antibodies swimming around in his blood, but given that this has never happened before, Tamara wants to be careful.

Fudge follows him to the hospital. Just as he gets there, he notices Zack coming down the steps with his mom, April.

Brett knows Liam said that April apologised, but he still stiffens a bit when he sees her. “Brett!” she says.

“Hi,” he replies. “What’s up?”

“Just a check-up,” she says.

“Hi Brett,” Zack says cheerfully. “Hi, Fudge!” He bends down to hug the dog happily. “Where’s Liam?” he asks.

“He’s on wall patrol,” Brett says. “No rest for the wicked, I guess. How’s your arm?”

Zack waves it at him; it’s a little disconcerting to see a smiling kid waving a handless stump at him, but Brett shrugs it off. “It’s good. I asked Dr. Deaton if I can have a hook or a knife or something to put on the end.”

“Yeah? Get a hook and you’d look like a pirate.”

“I said that! But he doesn’t know where to find any hooks.”

“Well, maybe you should ask Liam to keep an eye out,” Brett says playfully. “He’s going scouting tomorrow. Might be able to bring one back.”

“Okay, I will,” Zack says cheerfully.

“Brett,” April says quickly. “I’m sorry about what happened. To you, and what… how I reacted before, with Liam. I already apologised to him, but I feel like I owe you one as well.”

“It’s okay,” he says. “It’s over now.” He looks at Zack. “Hey, you wanna come with me to take Liam some lunch when I’m done?” he asks. “Bet he’d like visitors.”

“Okay,” Zack says, then turns to April. “Can I go?”

“You can go with Brett,” she says with a smile. “Will you bring him back before dinner?”

“Sure,” Brett says.

Zack accompanies him into the hospital, waits patiently while his blood is drawn, analysed, and given Tamara’s stamp of approval. After that, they leave, and Brett steers them to the inventory hall.

“Where’re we going?” Zack asks curiously, almost tripping over himself to keep up with Brett.

“Inventory, bud. Liam loves apples, and I’m kind of hoping they have some.”

They do; James smiles as he hands them over and tells Brett to bring Liam by sometime for dinner. Brett promises, and they head out to the wall.

Liam’s stationed right by the gate when they get there; he’s up the top, leaning against the wood that makes a sort of railing, looking bored as hell. There’s only so far he can pace before having to turn back now; they haven’t had the materials to rebuild the walkways where the trees came down.

“Li,” he calls.

Liam looks down, his face breaking into a smile. “Hey,” he calls back. “Gimme a second.”

He talks to someone else - a woman with red hair - before beginning to scale down the ladder. He looks pleased, surprised, to see them there. “What’s up?” he asks. “You done already? Hey, Zack.”

“Hi.” Zack hugs Liam tightly around the waist; Brett’s heart swells up at the sight. The kids around here really seem to like Liam. Then again, when Brett was out, Liam apparently spray-painted a hopscotch court and an elaborate, human-sized game of snakes and ladders onto the pavement for them to play with. Complete, he’s told, with two large, wooden dice.

“You babysitting Brett?” Liam asks.

Zack giggles and nods.

“Hard job, right?”

“I did bring you apples, but I don’t think I’ll give them to you anymore.”

“Aww,” Liam whines. “C'mon, please. I take it back.”

Brett tosses Liam an apple from the bag, watching as he catches it deftly and takes a bite. “Got friends in high places, I see,” he says, raising an eyebrow.

“Zack had to fight James for those, you know. I had to use child labour to get them.”

“That true?” Liam asks. Zack laughs again and nods, eyes bright.

“Well, I owe you for your service, then,” Liam teases, ruffling Zack’s hair. “I’m going scouting tomorrow. You want anything?”

“A hook,” Zack says, waving his stump again. “For my arm.”

“Right, right. So you can be a pirate. Anything else?”

“Comics?” Zack asks hopefully.

“I’ll have a look for you, buddy, promise.” Liam finishes off his apple and tosses the core to Fudge. It’s a good way of keeping him fed, at least, and the dog really seems to like apples as much as his master.

“Here.” Brett holds the bag out. “Take as many as you want. James said you deserve it.”

“Dunno what for, but don’t look a gift horse in the mouth and all that,” Liam murmurs, grabbing three apples from the bag and stuffing two in his pockets awkwardly. “Thanks. I’d better get back up there.” He ruffles Zack’s hair again. “Make sure you give Brett hell, okay?”

“Oh, thanks,” Brett says, but he’s smiling as Liam kisses him goodbye and heads back up the ladder - with an apple stuffed into his mouth.

“You guys kiss like my parents do,” Zack says, wrinkling his nose. For a moment, Brett’s heart sinks, until Zack continues, “I dunno why you wanna spit in someone else’s mouth.”

“Weird adult mating ritual,” Brett says. “One day you’re gonna wanna kiss a girl, you know.”

“Or a boy,” Zack says.

“Or a boy.”

“Am I allowed to kiss a boy?”

“Long as he wants you to, yeah.”

“When am I allowed to?”

“When you stop thinking kissing’s gross.”

~*~

Liam comes home that day in good spirits.

Sometimes, Brett thinks the boredom does him good. He’s still doing a job, but he gets to relax a little while he does it, and that’s never been a bad thing for anyone.

They go around to James and Amala’s place for dinner, like Brett promised. Amala’s thrilled to see Brett back on his feet, and she gives them both a hug - Liam’s is tighter and more motherly than Brett’s, and Brett loves watching Liam’s face crinkle with happiness as he squeezes her back.

Savannah refuses to sit in her chair during dinner, opting instead to sit on Liam’s lap. Liam - who’s left handed - insists it’s fine and that it’s not affecting his own ability to eat. He seems happy here, Brett realises. Safe. He seems like he feels safe.

After dinner, Savannah drags Liam out to her cubby house, and Brett helps with the dishes. “Thanks for having us,” he says.

“Our pleasure, Brett,” Amala says, smiling. “It’s nice to see you back on your feet. And Liam so happy.”

“He stayed here for a while, right?” Brett asks. “Was he…?”

They glance at each other. “He was… not in a good place,” James says quietly. “But he pulled through it. We gave him plenty to do to distract himself. I think being around Savannah helped.”

Brett nods. Liam likes kids; it would have. “Thanks,” he says. “For taking care of him.”

“Any time,” James says, and he means it. “He’s a good man. So are you. I told him that already.”

“We’ll be sad to see you go,” Amala says with a sad smile.

“Oh yeah,” he murmurs. “You guys know about that, huh?” With the community struck by disease, Amala’s been given the spot of a previous, second-tier council member. There are five of those to act as counterparts for the five main council members, and Brett thinks she’s a good fit. Level headed and calm, able to make good decisions.

“We wish you weren’t going,” Amala says. “But it’s for the best.”

“Only I have to go,” he murmurs. “I could leave Liam here.”

“Brett, Liam’s much safer with you,” James says. “Or at the very least not here. Logan’s not going to leave him alone. He’s getting harder to deal with, too. And besides, do you really think that after waiting for you to wake up for so long he’ll be willing to lose you?”

“No,” Brett sighs. “I just wish… I wish he got to live in peace.”

“We all do,” Amala says.

“Do you guys think there’s a cure out there?” Brett asks. “I mean seriously. Honest opinion time. Do you think this trip will be worth it?”

“There’s always been a way, Brett,” James says. “Until a few weeks ago, the zombie virus had a one hundred percent infection and fatality rate. Now it doesn’t. Things are always changing. Someone will know something.”

He feels comforted by that at least. The pervasive sense that he’s making the wrong decision on Liam’s behalf refuses to leave him, but at least he knows there’s some hope there. Before, they didn’t think there was a way out of this, except death.

Now, though… there’s a chance. Brett might die before he even reaches DC, but there’s a chance that if he does get there, someone can use his blood for a cure.

And that knowledge feels worth the risk.

~*~

Liam goes scouting at dawn, just as planned, and is back by that night.

Brett’s at the hospital, doing his physical therapy. His muscles have atrophied a little, and while he can run and walk and do most things just fine, there are some things he’s struggling with - a lot of fine motor control is one of them.

Liam’s been up since before sunrise, but he comes to the hospital straight after he gets back and sidles into Brett’s therapy room, where he’s sitting with Tamara. Liam’s ditched all his weaponry except for the standard stuff scouts carry around within the walls, and he looks tired, but he smiles when he enters.

“Hi.”

“Hey,” Brett says, surprised. “You didn’t have to come. Aren’t you tired?”

Liam shrugs a little. There are still marks on his shoulders and neck from the straps of his pack digging into him. “I guess.”

“Hi, chicken,” Tamara says.

“Hey.” Liam comes in properly and sits down on the floor when he sees there’s no other seat. Brett’s envious of the way he crosses his legs easily; he lost the flexibility to do that sometime after turning twenty, and now, every time he tries, his hips disagree with him.

“So,” Liam says. “What’re we doing?”

Brett’s meant to be catching a tennis ball. He can throw fine, but he still lacks the dexterity to catch; he’s missing more than seventy percent of Tamara’s throws. It’s embarrassing, so he’s happy when Tamara says, “Hand-eye coordination. How’s yours?”

She tosses Liam the ball, quickly, and he snatches it out of the air with his right hand before lobbing it back. “Pretty good.”

 _He would’ve been an amazing lacrosse player_ , Brett muses. The same hand-eye coordination is probably part of what makes Liam a skilled hunter.

“Do you wanna practice with Brett, then?” Tamara asks.

“Sure.” Liam catches the ball. “What’re you gonna do?”

“Oh, run some blood tests,” Tamara says. “I think you boys have this covered.”

With that - telling Brett to keep at it for the next hour or so - she leaves. Liam smiles at Brett and tosses him the ball. Brett misses.

“This sucks,” he says glumly.

“It’s okay. You’ll get better.” Liam retrieves the ball and tosses it again; Brett touches it this time, but fumbles. “Remember the first time I went walking after getting stabbed? We didn’t even make it to the end of the street before I was fucking exhausted and you carried me back.”

Brett sighs as Liam keeps throwing him the ball. “You’re a much better patient than me,” he says.

Liam shrugs. “Are there any more of these?”

“Uh - over there. Why?”

Liam grins. “I wanna show you something. But, okay-” He’s collecting the other tennis balls - “you can’t fucking laugh at me, I haven’t done this in years.”

“Done - oh my God!”

Brett’s pretty genuinely delighted to see Liam juggling two of the balls, then three, his tongue stuck out in concentration. “I’ve never known anyone who could juggle before,” he says. “That’s so fucking cool.”

“You’re really easy to please,” Liam teases, speeding up a little. “Not gonna lie, I’ve usually dropped them by this point.”

“Where’d you learn this?”

“Mason taught me.” Liam’s biting his tongue. “He used to do it when I was having an episode, he’d just keep tossing more balls into it so that I had to focus on them. Sometimes it worked. Ah, fuck.” One of the tennis balls falls to the ground. “See?”

“Will you show me how?”

“Yeah.” Liam gathers everything up and comes over to him - Brett’s sitting on an exam table. “Like this.”

“I can’t even catch them yet, Li,” Brett laughs.

“No, no, shh. Listen. Like this.” Liam’s smiling goofily as he starts juggling again. “Exactly like this. Once you’ve mastered tennis balls we’ll move onto knives.”

“Oh my God,” Brett laughs. “No.”

“Did you ever do that thing?”

“What thing?”

“The - wait, I was really good at this one too.” Liam abandons the tennis balls and takes out a pocket knife, meant for nothing more than picking locks and cutting string, and flips it open. “Like this.”

He splays his hand out on the table and takes a deep breath - then stops as Brett lunges and grabs the pocket knife from him.

“Whatever it is you’re about to do,” he breathes, “I’m not going to like it.”

Liam grins. “Suit yourself.” He puts the pocket knife back in his back pocket. “Okay, c'mon, seriously. Tamara told you to keep at it, so let’s keep trying.”

Brett sobers up immediately; his hand is kind of cramped. The area inside the bite is numb, so while he can move it, he has no idea how he’s moving it; not only that, but there seems to be at least some nerve damage in the rest of his hand. Nothing rehabilitation won’t cure, Tamara says, but frustrating to have to deal with all the same. His hand’s aching from contorting it, trying to make the muscles work in a way they don’t want to anymore.

“What’s wrong?” Liam asks.

“My hand hurts,” Brett admits softly.

Liam steps closer to him and takes Brett’s hand in both of his. His fingers are strong and callused, and he begins to knead at Brett’s palm and knuckles, working out the kinks.

“Thank you,” Brett says quietly.

Liam looks up at him, smiles. “No problem.” He’s doing a great job; Brett’s overworked muscles are already loosening up. “Still hurt?”

“Not as much.” He watches Liam work for a few minutes before saying, “Okay, I’m alright. Let’s get back to it - toss me a ball.”

Liam backs away, grabs the tennis ball, and throws it. Brett catches it the first try, and even better than knowing he can do it is watching Liam’s face light up with joy at the sight.

“What was that thing you were gonna show me with the knife?” Brett asks as they practice.

“Oh. Just some dumb thing that circulated on YouTube before the outbreak. It was this game where you sung a song and stabbed the table between your fingers, and the aim was to not cut yourself as you went faster and faster. I don’t wanna brag or anything, but I was pretty good at it.”

“I’m not sure it’s something to brag about,” Brett murmurs, concentrating on lobbing the ball back to Liam in a way he can catch. He overshoots, and Liam has to jump to catch it with his right hand. Brett smiles and claps at the effort.

“You ever think about basketball?” he asks.

“You have noticed I’m like five foot five, right?” Liam asks dubiously. “I’d get murdered.”

Brett smiles. “Nah, you’d be fine. I’d have to lift you to reach the hoop or something, but-”

Liam throws the tennis ball at him, way harder than necessary; Brett laughs as it bounces off his shoulder. Liam comes to retrieve it, grumbling, “Prick,” under his breath as he does.

The door opens; Brett looks up, and his stomach drops dramatically when Logan walks in, smiling without any warmth. “Hi, guys,” he says.

Liam’s whole spine goes rigid for a second, and then he straightens up. “Hi, Logan,” he says quietly.

Logan smiles a little wider; Liam’s got his head mostly down, eyes on the ground, a clear sign of submission. “Liam,” he says. “You look a little better. Much less strung out.”

“I feel better.”

Logan’s eyes skate over Brett. “You’re better too, I see.”

“Yeah.” He nods. “Much.”

Logan turns back to Liam. “I thought I’d find you here,” he says. “Well, to be honest, I knew I’d find you wherever Brett was. What are you two doing in here? Nothing inappropriate, I hope.”

Brett’s lip curls. There’s something incredibly fucked up about a middle aged man making sexual innuendos about his teenage boyfriend that has Brett’s hackles rising; he wants to tell Logan to beat it, but he takes his cues from Liam instead. Things have changed since he was in his coma, and now, Brett tries to take as many of his social signals from Liam as he possibly can - just to relearn what’s going on around here. If Liam doesn’t trust someone… well, neither does Brett.

“Therapy,” Liam says. “For his hand.”

“I see. How’s it coming along?”

“Tamara says he’ll be fine in no time.” Brett lets Liam talk for him; Liam knows what Logan wants to hear.

“Oh, good,” Logan says. “That’s good. And they’ve got you back on scouting detail?”

“They’re easing me into it.”

“I can tell. The days you go out, we have more meat. Seems as if you’re indispensible to the food production and sustainability of this community.”

Liam hesitates. “Just doing my job,” he says eventually.

“Hmm,” Logan says. “It’s a bit of a nuisance that they need you out there for food production… you’d be much more useful on a long-distance scouting team.”

“Oh, I couldn’t do that anyway,” Liam says softly. “My side - where I was stabbed - it still kind of fucks around with me.”

That’s a downright lie; Brett’s seen Liam’s medical file - sometimes he reads it just to reassure himself that Liam is actually alright, that there’s nothing wrong with him - and knows that Liam’s healthier than most of the people in River’s End.

“And I’m sure you don’t want to leave Brett,” Logan says, looking at Liam calculatingly.

“Not really,” Liam says bluntly.

“Liam… if you feel up to it, I’m organising a trip out to Ashburton. There could be valuable resources there.”

“Ashburton’s picked clean,” Liam says. “And I don’t really want to go back there anyway. Thanks for considering me, though.” The last part sounds frighteningly earnest; Liam could probably get away with murder at this point, his demeanour is so convincingly sincere.

Logan sighs. “I do want to give you a choice, Liam,” he says. “But at the end of the day, we need someone with inside knowledge of Ashburton to go with the team. That leaves you… or Brett.”

Liam’s gone stiff. There’s a long pause.

“Fine,” Liam says. “But not until Brett’s totally rehabilitated.”

“And how long will that be?” Logan asks.

“Months, potentially,” Brett says. He’s sort of panicking over the fact that Liam agreed to go with this fucking psycho.

Logan looks pretty displeased at that, but he’s got the answer he wanted from Liam - despite having to drag it out of him. “Alright,” he says. “That’s fine. Keep at it, then.”

He opens the door and leaves. Liam lets out a shaky breath.

“Why’d you agree?” Brett whispers.

Liam runs his hands through his hair. “Didn’t you hear him?” he moans. “He was gonna send you instead. I won’t let that happen.”

“Liam-”

“And besides.” Liam looks like he’s trying to pull himself back together. “Hopefully by then we’ll have a plan to get rid of the motherfucker.”

Brett wraps his arms around Liam’s waist, burying his head in Liam’s chest and swallowing. Liam’s trembling vaguely underneath him; Brett can’t be sure if it’s fear, anger, or some warped combination of the two.

“I won’t let anything happen to you,” Brett whispers into Liam’s chest.

“You might not get a say in that, Brett. You heard him, he-”

“You really think anyone is gonna send you back to Ashburton?” Brett asks, pulling away. “Nobody in their right mind would make you go back there. Logan’s the only one.”

Liam swallows, playing with the hairs on the back of Brett’s neck. “He wants you gone,” he says softly.

“I know.”

“I’m more worried for you than for me.”

Brett nods; he feels the same way. He’s more worried for Liam than himself. “I know.”

“I won’t let anything happen to you either.”

“I know you won’t.” Brett kisses Liam’s chest. “You’re like a little guard dog.”

“I’m not little.”

“You’re kind of little.”

“I am not.” Liam bends over and picks up a tennis ball. “Ready?”

“Yeah. As ready as I’ll ever be.”

~*~

“Bye, Brett.”

Brett stirs a little; Liam’s leaning over him, wearing a denim jacket over his shirt and his weapon belt, crossbow over his back. “Where’re you going?” he murmurs.

“Scouting, remember?” Liam leans down and kisses him gently. “I gotta go. Made you some coffee.”

“Mm, thanks. Love you.”

Liam’s eyes brighten. “You too.”

He forces himself to get up after Liam’s left the room - he doesn’t want to drink cold coffee. Liam’s made it just right, and Brett sits in the kitchen for twenty minutes or so, sipping it and yawning sleepily. Fudge lies at his feet, snoring a little.

He misses Liam already, and it hasn’t even been an hour. He gets outside, goes for a brief jog - he’s trying to build his strength and stamina up again. He doesn’t get all that far, really, before turning around and heading home to shower.

After showering, he messes around cleaning before dicking around for a bit - he hangs out with Kira and Lori, helps out in inventory, and plays with some of the kids on the giant Snakes and Ladders game Liam’s designed.

By the time that’s all done, it’s beginning to get dark; he gives up on distracting himself and heads to the hospital, about ready to beg them to let him work. When he gets there, one of the nurses - Gina - is coming down the steps.

“Hi, Brett,” she says cheerfully. “I was just looking for you.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Tamara sent me to find you. Said something about clearing you for working again?”

Brett brightens up. “Sweet. That’s what I’m here about.”

He finds Tamara in her study and undergoes a whole gambit of tests - heart and lungs, blood sugar levels, oxygen levels, strength tests, blood tests. Eventually, Tamara steps back from him and says, “Well… if you’re feeling well enough, I don’t see why not. You’re a perfect picture of health. How about starting tonight, around sundown?”

“Yes please,” Brett says, grinning. “I’m so bored. You have no idea.”

“Oh, by the way,” she says. “We have some new equipment - come down with me and I’ll show you how to use it.”

The new equipment turns out to be battery-operated, short-range radios. “The scouting teams have one,” she explains. “We have each other half. They’re all marked according to team - they aren’t good over distances, and it’s mostly just so that if someone’s hurt, they can tell us. It helps.”

“When did this happen?”

“About a week ago. Stiles found them while he and Scott were out scouting.” She straightens up. “To use them, you just have to hold down this button, okay? They’ll crackle when you’re receiving a transmission. Only Malia’s team is out right now, so if you hear anything, it’ll be them.”

“Has it been useful?” Brett asks curiously.

“Pretty useful. In either case, it’ll alert us to potential bite victims. They can call them in on the way through if they have to.”

 _Not that that matters without amputation_ , Brett muses. _Or…_

He looks down at his hand, wiggles his fingers. His thumb moves slowly, jerkily.

 _How many times can we do that, though?_ He wonders. _How many resources does it use? It must be a lot, and they’ve already done it for me and Zack…_

The radio next to Tamara crackles to life suddenly; she smiles at Brett. “Looks like you’re gonna get some practice right away,” she says. “Looks like the scouting team’s back early.” With that, she reaches for it and presses the receiver. “Hi,” she says. “Tamara. Are you transmitting on-”

“Open the gate!” Malia’s voice yells.

“Malia?” Tamara demands. “What’s-”

“There’s a herd right behind us, we have survivors-”

Wounded people? Brett’s heart jumps; Liam’s out there. And he didn’t hear Liam’s voice over the radio.

“Brett, you go,” Tamara says. “I’ll send people after you, okay? Treat whatever you can at the scene, get as many people back here as possible. You know what to do.”

Prioritise people who are critical, he thinks wildly as he sprints out of the hospital. Get them to the infirmary. Treat anything else on-site. Get the story. Get samples from everyone.

When he gets to the gate, it’s already open, and there are already people inside - more people than they sent out, at least ten, all looking like they’re different degrees of wounded and terrified. Only a few seem to have combat experience, judging by their weapons.

He searches desperately for Liam, but can’t see him - he can, however, see that there’s a group of thirty or so zombies on their tail, with more in the distance. The wall patrol are staring at the carnage, obviously horrified.

“Get everyone inside!” he bellows up at them. “Then close the gates! Take the zombies out from the wall or they’ll attract others!”

“Brett!”

He turns around. Scott’s hurrying towards him, half-carrying Liam, who has an arm around his shoulders. Liam’s wielding his crossbow with one hand - even as Brett watches, he turns around and sinks an arrow right between a zombie’s eyes.

“What’s going on?” Brett demands as he reaches them. “Liam?”

“I’m okay,” Liam says. “I’m fine.”

“He’s got shrapnel in his leg.” Scott looks terrified. “I got him here as soon as I could.”

“Shrapnel?” Brett demands. “Where the fuck did - okay, look, it doesn’t matter.” He looks around; there are no other infirmary staff here yet. “Liam-”

“There are people hurt worse than me,” Liam says, wincing as he shifts.

“Who? Who’s hurt worse?”

“A couple of the people we brought in - there’s a kid, her mom - DUCK!”

Brett ducks, and Liam fires his crossbow right over Brett’s head, toppling a zombie a few feet behind him. “Just go find them,” Liam pleads. “I’m okay with Scott.”

Even with a limp and one useful arm, Liam’s a pretty good person to have in combat, so Brett takes his word for it and searches out the kid and her mother. By the time he finds them - with Malia - there are nurses and infirmary staff on the scene, and he’s needed elsewhere. Elsewhere being fighting off the zombies.

He’s never been especially good at combat, but he’s okay with a machete and knives - better with guns, but the ammunition is more valuable than gold, and they make too much noise anyway.

With more people out here, it takes less time to subdue the zombies; everyone is inside just as the wall patrol close the gate on at least fifty of the snarling, snapping, hungry undead, and Brett backs away, telling the nurses to get critical patients to the hospital and treat everyone else on-site if possible. They disperse to do as they’re told.

“Brett!”

He hasn’t even had a chance to breathe when Malia flags him down. “Hey, Mal, I need to-”

“Liam’s bleeding really badly,” she says, her voice tight. “I think we need to get him to Tamara.”

He follows her; Liam’s leaning against a car, and now that Brett’s looking, there’s a blood soaked bandage wrapped around his thigh. He looks pale, but he’s alert and focussed.

“Is everyone okay?” he asks Brett, swallowing.

“Everyone’s gonna be fine.” He doesn’t strictly know if that’s true. “Is the shrapnel still in your leg?”

“Yeah. We couldn’t-”

“That’s a good thing,” Brett interrupts. “Mal, can you help me get him to the hospital?”

“It’s _good _there’s still shrapnel in my leg?” Liam asks, letting them help him away from the scene.__

__“It keeps the wound open,” Brett says, “but it’s also acting as a dam for any cut veins or arteries. We’ll leave it there until we can work out how to treat it.”_ _

__They manage to get to the hospital just as Liam mumbles that he’s starting to feel a little light-headed; Brett tries not to freak out as he takes Liam to an exam room, leaving Malia to find Tamara. They have blood, and they can give Liam a transfusion, but Brett doesn’t know how to do it._ _

__He has to lift Liam up onto the exam table gently and begins peeling back the soaked bandages; he can see a glint of metal in Liam’s leg, but he’s relieved to find it’s not long. It’s also embedded in the side of his thigh, far from any arteries._ _

__“How bad is it?” Liam asks._ _

__“Not as bad as I thought,” Brett replies truthfully. “Stay still, okay?” He lifts Liam’s legs up and puts a stack of books under them just as Tamara enters, looking frazzled and worried._ _

__“You two again,” she moans. “Are you ever not in trouble?”_ _

__“Sorry, doc,” Liam says with a small smile._ _

__“Okay.” She’s pulling gloves on. “What’re we working with?”_ _

__“Shrapnel, in his thigh - blood loss,” Brett recites. “I haven’t taken his blood pressure or heart rate yet.”_ _

__“Alright.” She peers at the wound with a flashlight. “I need some forceps,” she murmurs. “Can you get a pair of them and some needle and thread from the supply room for me?”_ _

__“Sure.”_ _

__When he gets back, Tamara’s listening to Liam’s heartbeat with a stethoscope. “What’s news?” Brett asks._ _

__“He’s tachycardic,” she murmurs. “And his pulse pressure is fairly narrow-”_ _

__“We don’t know what that means,” Brett interrupts, seeing how frazzled and worried Liam looks._ _

__“It means his heartbeat’s too fast and it’s affecting his blood pressure,” she says. “And feel his hands - he’s cold.”_ _

__“So what?” Brett demands._ _

__“So I’m going to take this shrapnel out and stitch him up and get him on a blood transfusion right away,” she says. “We could use saline to raise his blood pressure but we go through more of that than our blood supplies.”_ _

__“Really?”_ _

__“Saline is used to rehydrate people. Blood transfusions only really have one purpose for us.” She takes the forceps from Brett. “Hold still, chicken,” she murmurs to Liam._ _

__“You got it.” Liam still sounds coherent, even if he does look frighteningly pale. He meets Brett’s eyes briefly before closing them; he’s shivering a little. He doesn’t even twitch as Tamara begins to extract the shrapnel with the forceps._ _

__Brett holds his breath for almost twenty seconds while Tamara works the shard of metal out of Liam’s thigh. Eventually, when it’s free, Brett can see that it’s not big, or thick - Liam got lucky. Tamara puts it aside and begins looking again._ _

__“What are you-”_ _

__“Checking for more. We can’t leave it in there if there’s more of it.”_ _

__Liam lies still. His chest is rising and falling quickly, faster than usual, but he’s alert, if looking a little tired._ _

__It doesn’t take long for Tamara to fix the rest - a quick cleanup of the blood, antiseptic, and ten neat stitches to close the wound. “You’re doing a great job, Liam,” she says comfortingly._ _

__“I am?” Liam asks, sounding drowsy and bemused. “I mean I’m just lying here.”_ _

__“Do you know how to do a blood transfusion?” Tamara asks Brett softly._ _

__Brett swallows and shakes his head. He really wishes Liam would open his eyes or something. He’s seen people die of shock brought on by blood loss._ _

__“Okay.” Tamara smiles. “Well, you’re about to learn. How about you grab Liam a blanket and a pillow - I’ll go get a unit.”_ _

__A unit of blood. Brett does as she tells him to and finds a blanket and pillow; Liam’s shivering ceases once the blanket’s over him, and he lifts his head so Brett can slide the pillow beneath it._ _

__“Better?” Brett asks softly._ _

__“Mm. Warmer.” Liam opens his eyes and blinks. “Fuck, it’s bright in here.”_ _

__“Sorry, buddy,” Brett says, putting a hand on Liam’s shoulder. “We need to see what we’re doing.”_ _

__Liam squints at him unhappily before attempting to pull one side of the pillow over his face. His movements are lethargic, but not dangerously slow - Tamara did say he didn’t strictly need the blood, so the volume lost can’t be hugely significant._ _

__Brett moves so he’s blocking the light, and Liam relaxes, letting the pillow go. “I think I’m bleeding on the table,” he says, his voice quiet. “Sorry.”_ _

__Brett lifts the edge of the blanket to inspect the wound. There’s a little blood on the bandages Tamara put over the stitches, but that’s normal. “You aren’t,” he assures Liam, but he leaves Liam’s leg uncovered so he can access the wound site. “How’re you doing? Does it hurt?”_ _

__“Nope,” Liam says. “Not anymore.” He lifts his head and looks down. “I thought I felt a needle,” he mumbles._ _

__“Tamara probably gave you a local anaesthetic,” Brett realises aloud. “That’s good.” It would also explain why Liam didn’t even shift while he was having the metal removed._ _

__The door opens; Tamara’s back, holding IV equipment and a bag of blood. “Okay,” she says, smiling a little - it’s comforting, because Tamara has no poker face, and if Liam was in serious trouble, he would’ve known by now, just from looking at her._ _

__“Ready, Liam?”_ _

__“Do your thing,” Liam says drowsily. “I’ll just lie here.”_ _

__“Ah, you’re the perfect patient.” Tamara sets everything down. “Okay. It’s pretty standard stuff - you’ve done IVs before, and this isn’t too different. The main thing-” She’s getting a hollow-point needle and inserting it into a cannula - “Is to watch for allergic reactions. Can you do a tourniquet, sweetie?”_ _

__“Like?” Brett asks worriedly, wrapping the band around Liam’s bicep and tightening it. Liam’s veins take longer than usual to come to the surface._ _

__“Oh, hives, rashes, difficulty breathing. We can treat all that, but it’s best to catch it early.”_ _

__Brett takes the needle and cannula from her. Liam relaxes a little, realising Brett’s going to be the one inserting it._ _

__“Right here.” Tamara motions to Liam’s lower forearm. “If we have trouble getting it in, we can still move up.”_ _

__“Brett never has trouble getting it in,” Liam mumbles, then opens his eyes and grins at them sleepily._ _

__Tamara blushes deeply, but Brett’s relieved Liam’s making jokes at his expense. “You don’t exactly make it difficult,” he retorts as he swabs Liam’s arm with antiseptic._ _

__“You callin’ me easy?”_ _

__“Hey, you said it, not me,” Brett murmurs, sliding the needle into Liam’s arm. Liam’s hand twitches reflexively. “Sorry,” Brett murmurs._ _

__“You better make it up to me when I’m outta here,” Liam says, tilting his head to look at Brett._ _

__“I will.” The needle’s worked; Tamara nods at him proudly._ _

__“Alright. Now we connect this part.” She looks at Brett as she pulls out one of the pieces of tubing. “If we do this right, there shouldn’t be any backflow.”_ _

__“There’s so many pieces,” Liam mumbles suddenly. “You sticking all that in me?”_ _

__“Just what’s already there, sweetie,” she soothes. “Like this, Brett.”_ _

__She shows him how to connect the tubing to Liam’s cannula, flush the valve in the IV equipment with saline, and then hangs up the bag. “Now,” she murmurs, “we just…”_ _

__The blood starts flowing down the IV, into the valve, and into Liam’s arm. “Okay,” she says to Brett. “There we go. This could take anywhere from an hour and a half to two and a half hours, depending on his circulation. Watch out for the reaction symptoms, especially hives and shortness of breath.”_ _

__“I’m staying here?” Brett asks._ _

__“Oh, God,” Liam mumbles. “Don’t leave him with me, he’s gonna mom the shit out of me.”_ _

__“That’s what I’m hoping, chicken,” Tamara says, running her fingers through Liam’s hair fondly. “You’re staying here,” she continues, talking to Brett now. “Just in case of a reaction. Look, he might have a fever or have back and flank pain - that’s a sign of a reaction. If that happens, give him some Tylenol and Benadryl. You know where it is.”_ _

__“Is it normal to have a reaction?” Brett asks._ _

__“Well.” She looks at Liam, who seems to be dozing. “Not so much before, but we don’t have the same screening capabilities now.”_ _

__“Whose blood is he getting?” Brett asks, feeling panicky with the thought that thousands of diseases could be flooding into Liam’s body._ _

__Tamara smiles. “Mine.” She looks at Liam carefully. “Come and get me if he has symptoms,” she says. “We can stop the transfusion if we have to.”_ _

__“All that for nothin’,” Liam mumbles._ _

__“Stop backchatting,” Tamara scolds fondly._ _

__“Why’s he so tired?” Brett asks. “I didn’t think he’d lost that much blood.”_ _

__“He hasn’t.” Tamara’s still stroking Liam’s hair. “Malia said her team has been awake for almost twenty four hours. He just needs some rest. He’ll probably sleep.”_ _

__“Okay,” Brett murmurs._ _

__“I’ll come back in an hour, see how he’s doing,” Tamara says. “Keep an eye on him.”_ _

__“Will do.”_ _

__Tamara kisses Liam’s forehead before she leaves. Once she has, Brett tugs the blanket up around him a little better, covers his leg back up, and sits down in the chair._ _

__“Feeling okay?” he asks Liam quietly._ _

__Liam opens his eyes drowsily. “Mm.”_ _

__“Good. Get some sleep.”_ _

__“What about you?”_ _

__“What about me?” Brett plays with the fingers on Liam’s right hand - they’re limp, and he smiles as he starts pinching the tips of them, just for fun. He gets all the way to Liam’s thumb before Liam’s hand twitches underneath him._ _

__“Won’t you be bored?” Liam’s hand twitches again, and Brett grins - he’s got Liam’s fingers in his own, and he knows Liam’s too sleepy to pull away. He turns Liam’s index and middle finger into a pair of legs and begins making running motions - this is way too much fun._ _

__“What the fuck are you doing?” Liam says, a tired giggle on the end of his sentence._ _

__“Just messing with you.”_ _

__“You know, I’m not…” Liam pauses to yawn hugely. “I’m not Lori. I’m not going to have a fit of laughter when you play This Little Piggy with my fingers.”_ _

__“Aren’t you?” Brett knows he should probably let Liam sleep, but Liam’s got his eyes open and he’s smiling blearily and seems to want to engage in conversation, which is nice. “Let’s try.”_ _

__“No,” Liam moans, laughing as he tugs weakly at Brett’s grip. “No, I’m not a kid, I’m eighteen, I-”_ _

__“This little piggy went to market,” Brett starts, tugging on Liam’s index finger. He grins widely when Liam starts laughing - he knew Liam wouldn’t be able to resist. “This little piggy stayed home-”_ _

__“Stop,” Liam laughs. “Stop it.” He gives a slightly more enthusiastic tug. “I mean it. Don’t make me fight you.”_ _

__“Oh, you and what army?”_ _

__Liam wiggles the three fingers Brett hasn’t tugged on yet. “The leftover piggies.”_ _

__Brett laughs, surprised that Liam’s playing along with him. “You know there’s another version?” he asks, settling for holding Liam’s hand instead of tormenting him._ _

__“Another version?”_ _

__“Yeah. A vegan version.”_ _

__Liam giggles, slightly hysterically. “A vegan version? What the fuck for?”_ _

__“They take umbrage with “this little piggy had roast beef,” I think,” Brett says, “because their version says “this little piggy had jam and bread”, and involves no terrified screaming of the last pig on the way home.”_ _

__“That’s so fucking dumb,” Liam giggles breathlessly. “Oh my God.”_ _

__“Hey, hey, don’t judge them for their life choices, okay?”_ _

__“I’m not judging them for not eating meat, I’m judging them for changing the fucking nursery rhyme,” Liam says, smiling tiredly at Brett. “Like remember when they tried to change Ba Ba Black Sheep to Ba Ba Rainbow sheep, and a bunch of fucking conservative old fossils said it was too fucking gay.”_ _

__“Conservative old fossils are wont to say stupid things,” Brett replies with a smile._ _

__“As far as I’m concerned,” Liam says, and then yawns, “nothing can ever be too gay.”_ _

__Oh my God, Brett thinks, looking at his drowsy, smiling boyfriend. I love you so much._ _

__“I just thought something that you’d find too gay,” Brett says._ _

__“Oh yeah?” Liam peels his eyes open. “What’s that?” He looks like he’s barely clinging to consciousness; Brett resolves to make this the last thing he really says before letting Liam sleep._ _

__“I just thought about how much I love you,” Brett smiles sweetly._ _

__“Ugh,” Liam mumbles, putting a hand over his eyes. “God. Get the fuck out.”_ _

__“I can’t. I have orders to stay right here.”_ _

__“I don’t give a shit…” Liam yawns hugely. “About your orders.” He finishes his sentence in a whisper; Brett smiles._ _

__“Get some sleep,” he says. “You feeling okay?”_ _

__“Mm.”_ _

__Brett looks up at the bag of blood. It doesn’t look any emptier, but Liam’s starting to flush around his face and neck, and even his fingers - which Brett’s still holding loosely - are feeling warmer. The blood transfusion is already working._ _

__Liam sleeps for the next two hours as Tamara’s blood drains into his body. Brett checks his temperature a few times, and the wound on his leg. The stitches are holding steady._ _

__Tamara comes in around the hour mark to check on Liam; Liam sleeps through her ministrations. “Okay,” she murmurs. “No fever, no pain… the flushing is normal. This is great.”_ _

__Brett’s surprised when, almost two hours in, the door opens and reveals Malia. He would’ve thought she’d gone home; she must be as tired as everyone else._ _

__“Hey,” he says. “Man, I thought you would’ve been out of here by now. Tamara said you guys haven’t slept in ages.”_ _

__“We haven’t.” Malia steps closer, hesitantly, and Brett scoots his chair back so she knows it’s okay to come closer. “Is he okay?” she asks._ _

__“Yeah, he’s doing fine. Lost a bit of blood, but he’s getting a transfusion.” Brett gestures to the bag. “He fell asleep a while ago.”_ _

__Malia stays where she is for a moment. “Can I sit?” she asks._ _

__“Yeah, of course.” Brett watches her pull up a chair. “He’ll be happy you came.”_ _

__“I just wanted to make sure he’s okay,” she says. “I feel bad that he got hurt.”_ _

__“It happens,” Brett says with a small smile. “He’s gonna be fine. He’s just being a baby.”_ _

__Malia shakes her head. “He went out under my watch and he got hurt,” she says softly. “I’m responsible for that.”_ _

__“Don’t beat yourself up,” Brett murmurs. “He’s nearly died under my watch about a thousand times.”_ _

__Malia nods. “Is he staying overnight?”_ _

__“Just for the blood transfusion,” Brett says. “Then we’re heading home.”_ _

__Liam’s head rolls to the side. “Home?” he asks sleepily._ _

__“Yeah,” Brett says. “You’re almost done. We’ll go home soon.”_ _

__“Sweet.” Liam opens his eyes. “Hi, Mal.”_ _

__“Hi, Liam,” Malia says. “You okay?”_ _

__“Hmm? Yeah, I’m okay. Sleepy.” Liam yawns. “You?”_ _

__“Tired,” she agrees. “I’m sorry about-”_ _

__“Not your fault,” Liam says with a drowsy smile. “Some fucker who set off the explosion… it was their fault.”_ _

__Malia smiles a bit. “You should know that Kira’s going to swoop down on you first thing tomorrow morning and mother you.”_ _

__“Oh goody, I’ll have two moms,” Liam says, looking at Brett teasingly._ _

__Malia leaves with a ruffle of Liam’s hair and instructions to feel better. Liam’s awake now, and he tips his head up to look at the bag of blood._ _

__“Almost done,” he says, surprised. “Did I sleep that long?”_ _

__“Yeah. Tamara came in to check on you, but you were out.” Brett sits back a little. “You feeling okay? No pain?”_ _

__“Nope.”_ _

__“Good.” He grabs a bottle of water and hands it over to Liam, who drinks thirstily. “Liam, hey. What happened out there? It was meant to be a routine scout, right?”_ _

__Liam starts sitting up a little; he looks stronger, alert, so Brett doesn’t stop him. “It was,” he admits. “We ran into trouble, sort of. Well, we were fine - we were scouting a town a few dozen miles out from here. We ran into those people - we didn’t manage to get the full story, but they were hurt and mostly civilians and there were zombies coming. They agreed to the interview process and stuff, and everything was actually sort of going okay until we started coming back here.”_ _

__“What happened?”_ _

__“There was a herd. About a mile out. We managed to split it off into two groups - I took the left wing and Malia took the right, and we fired flare guns.”_ _

__“Flare guns?” Brett worries. “Wouldn’t that attract attention?”_ _

__“We didn’t have a choice,” Liam murmurs. “It was that or we all died. Anyway, we cleared a path for the others. But someone lured that herd there. I know they did. It wasn’t there during my last scouting trip and there was this explosion - that’s when I got hurt. A few people died. None of ours, but…”_ _

__“An explosion?” Brett demands._ _

__“Yeah. Like a homemade bomb or something.”_ _

__“Do you think Logan had something to do with it?” Brett asks quietly._ _

__Liam hesitates. “I dunno,” he says uncertainly. “I mean, he’s shady as fuck. But I don’t think he’s that shady. What was the point of blowing everyone up? He doesn’t know we’re onto him. There’d be no point. And besides, when the bomb was… you know, exploded or whatever, it was around the people we were bringing back. Not us. I wasn’t even really nearby, I just got unlucky.”_ _

__“Sounds about right,” Brett says dryly. “I’m gonna check your bandages, okay?”_ _

__“Okay.”_ _

__Brett checks Liam’s bandages, then the stitches, which are clean and not in the least bit swollen. Next he takes Liam’s temperature and asks if he’s in pain - no - and, upon finishing all that, sits back down._ _

__“Well, you look better,” he says._ _

__“I feel better. More awake anyway.”_ _

__“Well, you slept through the whole thing, you lazy prick. I was the one who sat attentively at your bedside and tended your wounds.”_ _

__Liam laughs. “Thanks for staying. I’ll make it up to you.”_ _

__“Oh yeah? How’s that?”_ _

__“How about he tells you when I’m not present?” Tamara’s voice says. Brett turns around to see her smiling tiredly. “How’re you feeling, chicken?”_ _

__“Much better,” Liam declares._ _

__“Good.” She looks at the bag. “Looks like you’re pretty much done. I’m gonna start getting you unhooked, okay? Then you and Brett can go home.”_ _

__“Sweet.”_ _

__Tamara gets Liam disconnected from everything and patches his arm up, then passes over some pain relief medication to Brett - Brett pockets it, knowing they won’t use it. After that, they leave the hospital._ _

__Brett blinks. It’s gotten dark, and there are only a few lights on. He can’t wait to be home, in bed, with Liam. Who’s limping along beside him and not making a word of complaint._ _

__“Want some help?”_ _

__“I’m okay. It doesn’t really hurt. I think the anaesthetic is still working.”_ _

__“Okay.”_ _

__When they get in, they take a shower. Liam’s sleepy again by the time they’re out, and he pulls one of Brett’s shirts on before crawling into bed with a happy groan._ _

__“Bed,” he mumbles._ _

__“You’re so good at naming objects, baby,” Brett coos, getting in behind Liam and moving over so Fudge has room to get up with them. He sniffs curiously at Liam’s injured leg, smelling the blood, gives Liam’s face a brief lick, and lies down at their feet with a huff._ _

__Brett curls around Liam’s body protectively, reaching down to stroke the back of his thigh. Liam sighs happily and melts against him, body totally lax._ _

__“You like that, huh?”_ _

__“Mmm.” Liam sounds out of it - the two hours was barely enough to offset the previous twenty four. “S'nice.”_ _

__Brett keeps stroking the back of Liam’s thigh gently, occasionally kneading his hamstring. Liam bats his hand away when Brett tries to reach - innocently - under Liam’s boxers. He’s not going for Liam’s dick, he just kind of wants to grab his butt a bit._ _

__“Get outta there,” Liam mumbles. “I’m sleepy.”_ _

__“Aw, okay.” Brett kisses Liam’s ear. “Night.”_ _

__“Night, Brett.”_ _

__~*~_ _

__Liam’s nuzzling right into his chest when Brett wakes up._ _

__It’s pretty clear he’s still out; he’s rolled onto his other side to be able to tuck his face into Brett’s neck and throat, and his arms are wound around Brett’s body._ _

__Brett huffs. He hardly ever gets to wake up in this position - mostly because the bed’s not really long enough for his body - and it looks really comfortable. So he starts shuffling them around until he’s got his face planted squarely between Liam’s pecs, with Liam’s arms around his neck and his leg slung over Brett’s waist._ _

__“So comfy,” Brett mumbles into Liam’s chest._ _

__The best thing about this is that Liam hugs kind of like a boa constrictor; Brett’s always liked how fucking strong Liam is, and how muscular. It’s vastly different from being with a girl, but in a good way._ _

__Liam’s leg shifts, squeezes; his arm tightens around Brett’s shoulders. “Hey,” he mumbles. “Fuck, where - oh. There you are.”_ _

__“Yep. Very astute of you to notice.”_ _

__Liam squints at him - with one eye, because the other is still shut. “What’s astute?” he mumbles sleepily._ _

__“Perceptive. Smart.”_ _

__“Oh. Yeah, well. You’re.” Liam blinks. “Not usually down there?”_ _

__“I felt like being snuggled,” Brett says, batting his eyelashes. “How’s your leg?”_ _

__“It’s okay. It doesn’t hurt that much.” Liam rolls a little, and Brett moves so he can twist to look at his thigh. The bandage around it is clean and white - no pinkish bloodstains showing through._ _

__“Good,” Brett says. Liam really can’t get another infection - he doesn’t want to think about what could happen if antibiotics failed to contain it, which, given how strong the ones Liam was on in Ashburton were, would probably happen._ _

__Liam groans as he starts to sit up. “I gotta go,” he says apologetically._ _

__“Already?”_ _

__“We didn’t debrief or whatever. Plus we have to vouch for those people. That’s sort of how it works apparently.”_ _

__“You have to vouch for them?”_ _

__Liam stands up, wincing a little. “It’s what the others did for us when they brought us in,” Liam explains. “We basically have to tell the council that they aren’t crazy or dangerous or anything like that.”_ _

__“And they take your word for it?” Brett asks._ _

__“It’s not like they can do background checks anymore, right?” Liam says with a shrug. “So yeah.”_ _

__“What happens if someone isn’t up to scratch?”_ _

__Liam pauses, looking a little put out - blank. “I dunno actually,” he says. “Nobody’s ever told me and I’ve never - well, I’ve never brought anyone back alive before now. So I don’t really know what they do if one of them just isn’t, I dunno, cooperative?”_ _

__Brett nods. “And what about Logan?” he asks. “What’s going to happen when he causes more problems?”_ _

__Liam’s spine stiffens at the mention of Logan, but Brett presses on. “We can’t leave for Washington until he’s out of the picture,” he points out. “And if what you’ve said is true we can’t risk having him in power much longer. He’s too dangerous.”_ _

__“I know.” Liam rubs his head with both hands. “We’re working on it. We can’t just go around telling people he’s a psychopathic asshole, you know? They wouldn’t believe us. We need… evidence, or proof, or… I dunno. Just… something other than our word, I…”_ _

__He looks so lost Brett feels awful for bringing it up; he sits at the edge of the bed and pulls Liam until Liam’s standing between his legs, puts his hands on Liam’s waist, and presses his thumbs into the bottom of Liam’s ribcage. His scar glints in the morning light - a white line, straight across, a strike against his life. How many more chances is Liam going to get?_ _

__“You can do it,” Brett says softly, and Liam swallows, looking down at him. His skin is hot - Liam’s like a little heater pretty much all year round. “Hey. Listen. You’ve got Malia and Stiles and Scott and hell, if you think Kira’s gonna let anyone hurt you now that she’s a momma bear… or Tamara, for that matter… and you’ve got me. I’m on your side. Remember?” He smiles. “We. Isn’t that what you said to me last week?”_ _

__Liam smiles a little. His eyes are wet. “Yeah. Guess I did.”_ _

__“There you go.”_ _

__“I’m lucky,” Liam says._ _

__“What makes you say that?”_ _

__Liam’s hand strokes the back of his neck. “Everyone else,” he murmurs, “if they had loved ones who got bit, they lost them. I’m… maybe the only person who hasn’t had to face it. Not with you.”_ _

__“I had pretty good incentive to come back,” Brett says softly. “I heard you talking. I don’t remember any of what you said, but I heard you talking.”_ _

__“I was gonna bring you earplugs,” Liam admits. “Because of all the beeping and stuff. I just kept thinking that if you were alert it was probably really pissing you off.”_ _

__Brett laughs. “Thanks.” It’s sweet that Liam remembered that. “Hey, listen - I have to go into the hospital today. Help out with the newbies you brought in. You reckon you could bring some powertools down there when you’re finished up?”_ _

__“Sure,” Liam says. “Why?”_ _

__“We’re trying to build some stuff for the kids. They get bored.”_ _

__“Okay, will do. Just write down what you need and I’ll bring it to you. Can I help out?”_ _

__“Need all the help we can get,” Brett says with a small smile. “Go for your life. Just be careful of your leg, okay? Hurts too bad, let me know and I can get you something for it.”_ _

__Liam shrugs. “It’s fine for now. I just wanna know how the fuck there was an explosion.”_ _

__“You and me both.” Brett get out of bed too. “You’d better get going. I’ll see you later, okay?”_ _

__“Okay.”_ _

__~*~_ _

__Brett’s assigned to check up on a few of the kids._ _

__They seem to like him, and the feeling’s mutual; he thinks they’re pretty sweet, usually, and even when they’re not, he can at least understand and sympathise._ _

__Liam comes in two hours after he’s started; Tamara waves Brett off, telling him to check Liam’s wound and change the bandages. Liam seems jittery and irritated as they dodge people in the hallway, trying to get to an exam room._ _

__“Alright,” Brett says as they enter. “Jeans off.”_ _

__“I gotta talk to you about the power tools,” Liam says, unbuckling his belt. “The ones you asked me to pick up?”_ _

__“Oh yeah. Where are they, by the way?”_ _

__“Gone,” Liam says, hopping out of his jeans and up onto the exam table. “I tried to go sign them out at Hardware and none of them were there. Mr. Yukimura was on - he says they were there a few days ago and that no one’s signed them out.”_ _

__“They’re gone?” Brett demands, snipping through Liam’s bandages. “All of them?”_ _

__“All of them. Someone’s taken them or something. And, you know - not even signed them out, which means they went in at night, when no one was around. Ow, Jesus.”_ _

__Liam’s wound looks good, clean; Brett covers it with a thin layer of antiseptic cream before getting another bandage on it. “So not only are the powertools missing,” he says slowly, “we have no idea who took them or when?”_ _

__“Pretty much.”_ _

__Brett gnaws his lip. “Could this have had something to do with the explosion?” he asks softly._ _

__Liam blinks; he’s leaning down to pick his jeans up. “You think someone in here did this?”_ _

__“There are no other towns around. Nobody could have broken in, either. So it had to have been someone in here, or someone in here working with someone out there.” Brett chews his lip. “Could you get back out there?” he asks._ _

__“To the explosion site? They probably wouldn’t let me. Tamara hasn’t cleared me for another trip yet. Why?”_ _

__“I don’t know. Might be something out there that could help us.”_ _

__Liam chews his lips nervously. “I mean I - I could probably sneak out,” he admits. “It’d be easy enough. But I’m not sure what I’m looking for anyway.”_ _

__Brett nods. “Could I sneak out with you?”_ _

__Liam’s jaw drops. “Seriously?”_ _

__“Two pairs of eyes are better than one.”_ _

__“Well yeah, I have shit vision,” Liam says, and Brett laughs. “Seriously, you wanna risk it?”_ _

__“Gotta take risks now, Li,” Brett sighs, shaking his head. “How’s your leg?”_ _

__“Doesn’t hurt too bad.” Liam buckles his belt. “We should tell Malia and the others,” he murmurs. “They could cover for us. Make sure nobody tried to find us. Maybe they could look for the power tools as well.”_ _

__Brett nods. “You cover that, then. I’ll get some packs ready and get tomorrow off. We’ll go first thing in the morning.”_ _

__~*~_ _

__“Watch your head.”_ _

__Brett ducks at Liam’s whispered instruction. It’s just past five in the morning, and the first rays of light are beginning to make themselves known over the horizon line._ _

__“Will we be able to get back in this way?”_ _

__Liam makes a motion for him to stop talking, so Brett does. They’re climbing out through one of the holes - Liam fits just fine, what with being smaller than Logan, but Brett really had to squeeze through._ _

__Liam straightens up a little and looks around, eyes alert, posture tense. Liam’s used to waking up at this time to go on scouting trips, and he’s already in survival mode. Brett watches him scan the horizon slowly._ _

__“Okay,” Liam whispers. “Stay behind me, okay?”_ _

__Brett wants to argue that he’s not a kid, but he does as he’s told, watching Fudge’s tail sway in front of him. The dog stays perfectly in step with Liam, never deviating from his side. Liam, for his part, walks slowly, crossbow up. This’ll take them all day if they keep going like this._ _

__They round a corner, and Brett feels himself lose his breath. He hasn’t been outside the walls and houses in so long, he’d almost forgotten what it was like; the plains stretch for miles ahead, dotted with trees here and there. The only sound is the grass whispering as they move through it, and the crickets, which fall silent upon their approach._ _

__“It’s big,” he breathes._ _

__“Yeah. And flat. Open. Stay close, okay?” Liam’s moving a little quicker now, limping slightly, but seeming mostly unbothered by his leg. “There’s a thicker patch of trees about a mile away.”_ _

__“Is that where you caught the deer?”_ _

__“Yeah.”_ _

__Fudge pauses, sniffs, then gives a soft yelp. Brett’s never heard that noise before, but apparently Liam has, because he follows Fudge forward through the grass._ _

___He’s not just good at scouting_ , Brett realises. _He’s at home here. He’s comfortable being out in the open. The walls must feel like…__ _

__“How have you felt?” Brett asks softly._ _

__Liam turns to him a little; his eyes are trained forward, but the way he’s got his shoulder tilted lets Brett know that he is paying attention. “In general, or about something specific?”_ _

__“Both, I guess. How do you feel about living in River’s End?”_ _

__Liam shrugs slightly. “It’s good. Nice to have somewhere to come back to every night, you know? Almost feels like home, 'specially now that you’re back. But… I feel kind of… disconnected from everything else, you know? Like we’re just living in this tiny little bubble waiting to die.”_ _

__Brett doesn’t rebut him. Truth be told, he was sort of starting to feel that way even Before - the endless monotony of school, work, sleeping, and eating was grinding him down; he was living for weekends and getting fucked up and going camping and doing something, anything, to get away from the usual routine. There were always distractions, but Brett thought they were just that… shiny baubles to distract from the fact that they were all, ultimately, slowly dying._ _

__“You like being out here?”_ _

__“Sometimes. I’d like it more if there were less zombies. And bombs, Jesus.” Liam turns, smiling. “I like being out with you. Feels sorta like old times, right?”_ _

__“Right,” Brett agrees. “We did spend a lot of that time getting stabbed, sick, hungry, and cold, but…”_ _

__“But it was romantic because we were together,” Liam says sweetly, batting his eyelids._ _

__Fudge gives another soft yelp; Liam turns, whistles quietly. Fudge begins making his way back._ _

__“What is that?” Brett asks. “That noise he’s making?”_ _

__“Oh. He’s letting me know there are rabbits nearby.” Liam gives Brett a small smile. “I trained him to do it while you were out. He’s a good dog, y'know? Smart.”_ _

__“Sounds like it,” Brett murmurs, watching as Fudge returns to Liam’s side and wags his tail a few times. Liam strokes his ears for a moment before continuing forward - he seems a little more relaxed now, and they’re moving a bit faster._ _

__“He knows zombies too,” Liam says. “He can smell 'em up to half a mile away. It’s great.”_ _

__“Smart pooch,” Brett says, and Fudge looks at him, mouth open and tail wagging again, like he knows he’s being spoken about. Brett smiles._ _

__They keep walking, mostly in silence - not that Brett particularly minds that. He knows that Liam’s completely focussed on getting them out there and back in one piece. If one of them gets hurt, they sure as shit won’t be able to lie about where it happened._ _

__They’ve been walking for a little more than half a mile when Fudge stops and whines pitifully. Liam looks down at him, then back at the horizon - Brett’s beginning to see the patch of trees Liam hunted the deer in._ _

__“Still biters, huh?” Liam asks Fudge softly._ _

__“There are walkers out here?”_ _

__“Probably near the explosion site.” Liam looks guilty. “We… we didn’t have time to put down the corpses,” he says softly. “So… that’s probably what Fudge is sensing.”_ _

__Brett nods once. It makes sense, but he knows Liam’s probably pretty wrecked over having to leave some of them to turn._ _

__“Stay behind me, okay?” Liam asks him softly. “I’m gonna clear the area when we get there. I don’t want you to get hurt.”_ _

__There mustn’t be many of them. If Liam thought he needed backup, he’d ask for it. Brett nods and continues to follow Liam forward, keeping a little distance between them._ _

__The site of the bomb turns out to be an old car wreck, just off the highway; there must be four or five regular sedans there, plus a huge, overturned truck. The side of it is mangled; that’s where the explosion must of happened. It would make sense that Liam would come here for cover from zombies._ _

__There are four zombies at the site - all very recently turned, uncannily human like apart from the blood and the white, lifeless irises of their eyes. Liam puts each one down silently and efficiently, then checks the entire area before motioning Brett over._ _

__“I’m sorry about those people, Liam,” Brett murmurs softly._ _

__Liam shrugs. “Thanks,” he replies quietly. “I didn’t know them. At all, really.”_ _

__“Doesn’t mean you didn’t feel it.” If there’s any one thing Brett’s learned about Liam from arriving at River’s End, it’s that Liam feels most things pretty deeply and fiercely. He just doesn’t ever let it show. It could be tied into his dad, or the apocalypse, or it could just be how Liam is. Brett will likely never know for sure._ _

__“Can you boost me?” Liam asks. “I’ll look inside the truck for the tools.”_ _

__“Sure.” Brett helps Liam up into the truck - Liam climbs him easily, like’s a tree or something. “Be careful.”_ _

__“Always am,” Liam says._ _

__Right. I’m the one who’s not careful, Brett muses. Which is how I ended up bit in the first place._ _

__Fudge whines. Brett turns around; Liam reappears at the edge of the truck’s storage bay and looks around carefully, then down at Fudge._ _

__“I’m barely five feet away from you,” he scolds lightly. “And you’ve got Brett.”_ _

__“Find anything?”_ _

__“Nope. It’s empty.” Liam shuffles to the edge, and Brett helps him down, smiling as he’s reminded of the first time he ever boosted Liam somewhere - into the tank, the first week they’d met, much to Liam’s ire._ _

__They check the cars and even the surrounding grassland, but nothing turns up - that is, until Liam finds a fragment of something in the grass._ _

__“Check it out,” he murmurs, lifting it up._ _

__Brett looks. It’s corrugated aluminium. “This looks like what they use to build the walls,” he says. “It’s cheap shit.”_ _

__Liam nods. “Does it match what was pulled out of my leg?”_ _

__Brett blinks. “Uh - yeah. It does.”_ _

__Liam clenches his jaw. “Someone tried to fucking blow me up.”_ _

__“I don’t think it was personal, Li…”_ _

__“I don’t care. Might not’ve been, but four people still died.” He puts the shrapnel in his pocket. “Let’s go. Compare it to the stuff used on the walls.”_ _

__It doesn’t take them as long to walk back; Liam keeps a brisk pace, only slowing when Brett starts to struggle. He’s lost a lot of his fitness, and it’s hard to keep up with Liam when Liam seems to have spent most of that six week period exercising - pulling much more than his own weight to make up for how many people they lost._ _

__“I’m still proud of you,” Brett says._ _

__“For what?” Liam falls back beside him. Brett likes it better when they walk together._ _

__“For how you reacted when I was in my coma. Kira said it to me once. You could’ve laid down and died, but you didn’t.”_ _

__Liam shrugs. “It’s not what you would have wanted me to do.”_ _

__The confession sits in Brett’s throat the whole way back. All this - everything Liam achieved. Just for him? Because he wanted… what? Not to seem weak? Not to let Brett down?_ _

__“Check it out,” Liam murmurs as they reach the walls; he holds up the fragment from his pocket. “It’s exactly the same.”_ _

__“Whoever stole the power tools probably used them to rip open the wall, and create the bomb,” Brett says softly. “They must’ve used the leftovers for parts.”_ _

__“Whoever?” Liam asks incredulously. “Brett, we know who did this.”_ _

__“Yeah, Liam, we do,” Brett hisses. “Most of the town doesn’t even know what happened two days ago, or that the holes were made intentionally, because we’re trying not to fucking frighten them. How d'you think it’d go down if we told them their outwardly nice, genial leader is a fucking nutcase hellbent on starting war?”_ _

__“Not well,” Liam mumbles reluctantly._ _

__“Right. So we need proof. Guess we’ve got it now.”_ _

__“Logan’s shirt scrap that was found here,” Liam says. “The blood. That the holes were made from the inside. The leftover scrap metal being found at the bombsite. And if people don’t believe that-”_ _

__“You have the injury to prove it,” Brett finishes._ _

__Liam nods. “Let’s go in,” he murmurs, ducking through the metal. “I’m gonna find the others. Meet back at the town centre?”_ _

__“Got it.”_ _

__Brett dumps their things and leaves Fudge at the house; the only thing he keeps is the scrap of metal. He goes to the hospital, to the exam room Liam was treated in, hoping Tamara hasn’t changed out the trash yet._ _

__She hasn’t. The bloody shrapnel is still in the bin in the corner; Brett lifts it, his stomach churning as he remembers Tamara prying it out of Liam’s leg with forceps._ _

__He’s just leaving the hospital when he runs into Liam on the stairs. “Hey,” he says. “What’s-”_ _

__“The town centre’s packed, dude. Check it out.” Liam turns and points; what must be all of River’s End’s population is gathered there. There’s movement from within the crowd._ _

__“Come on,” Brett murmurs, rushing down the steps. James, Amala and Savannah are standing on the outer edges, also following the crowd._ _

__“James!” Brett calls._ _

__James barely even looks; Liam catches up to them quicker. “Hey,” he says. “Hey - James, wait!” He has to hurry to keep up; his legs are much shorter than James’. “What the hell is going on?”_ _

__“Those are the refugees you rescued,” Brett realises, seeing the group at the centre._ _

__“They’re being sent away,” James says. “Logan wants them gone-”_ _

__“What? What for?” Brett demands as Liam runs ahead to catch up._ _

__“We don’t know. We vouched for them, cleared them - Savannah made friends with a few of them, and from what we can tell, there was no problem with their interviews or the other council members-”_ _

__“Logan!” Liam yells, pushing through the crowd. Brett follows him._ _

__Logan turns; so does everyone else in the town centre. Most of the people being escorted out - by reluctant-looking wall scouts - are crying, except one of the men and a few of the younger kids - too young to understand what’s happening, at any rate._ _

__“Can I help you, Liam?”_ _

__“What’s going on?” Liam demands. “We were just told you’re sending them back-”_ _

__“That’s the one who gave me food, Mommy,” one of the little girls whispers. And of course Liam’s invested - Liam stuck his neck out to keep these people alive and safe, bonded with them, protected them on the way home-_ _

__“We’re not accepting them into the community,” Logan says calmly._ _

__“Why?” Liam pushes angrily._ _

__“Because they don’t fit our acceptance guidelines.”_ _

__“We vouched for these people!” Liam protests. “Isn’t that how it works? The whole scouting team has to be in unanimous agreement about it, vouch for them, they have their psych evals and physicals done-”_ _

__“Several members failed the evaluations and physicals,” Logan says._ _

__“No they didn’t,” Tamara pipes up; she’s sweating, looks nervous and scared. “I was there for every evaluation and did the lab tests myself. Every member passed.”_ _

__Brett pulls one of the men aside; he twitches, but lets it happen. “Ask him if the kids can stay,” he murmurs into his ear, and then backs away. The adults of River’s End have one top priority: the kids. Nobody wants to see them hurt or encounter zombies._ _

__The man clears his throat. “Will you at least take our children?” he begs._ _

__No man’s above begging when his kids are involved, Brett thinks gravely._ _

__There’s a pause. Then, “No. We don’t have enough-”_ _

__“Bullshit!” Liam bellows, and a few heads whip around to look at him. “We have plenty! Malia and I bring home game and supplies every time we go out! There’s enough here for everyone! Especially kids! We have space, we have people who would foster them-”_ _

__Logan steps close to Liam; his gaze is black. “What place does a mentally ill teenager have in taking care of those around him?” he demands coldly._ _

__“I might be sick,” Liam replies, his voice shaking. “I’ll own it. But I’m not the one going around threatening to turn peoples’ life support off to blackmail said mentally ill teenager into a fucking suicide mission to start a fight we have no fucking hope of winning.”_ _

__Murmurs rise up around them; Brett’s counting more than a few expressions of dissent. He hears the words _life support_ and _turn off_ , but they don’t register. Not right now._ _

__“You’re also not the one making holes in the walls to let zombies in to hurt and infect people,” Stiles says conversationally. “That would be Logan. Oh, and uh - those missing powertools?” Stiles motions to the ground behind him; the tools are laid out neatly on the ground, along with some kind of manual. “We found those in your house.”_ _

__“We also found human blood at the holes,” Malia interjects. “They were made from the inside. The metal had been forced outward.” She holds up a scrap of Logan’s shirt. “This look familiar?”_ _

__"We also have scraps of shrapnel from the bomb site," Liam says coldly. "One pulled out of my leg, one where it went off. They both match the metal used to make the walls."_ _

__The air is dead. Brett kneels down in front of the kids, not paying attention to what’s going on behind him, and smiles kindly; they look scared._ _

__“Go back to your parents,” he says. “You aren’t going anywhere.”_ _

__There’s movement behind him - Brett turns to see Logan, gun out, pointing right at him, and for a moment, he thinks - _this is it. It was never gonna be a zombie that got me; it was always going to be a person.__ _

__He sees Liam move - so fast it’s almost unbelievable. He fires his crossbow into Logan’s shoulder and, using the residual shock it causes as a weapon itself, swings the butt of his crossbow upwards into Logan’s chin._ _

__The reverberating crack has everyone flinching; Logan drops like a ton of bricks to the ground, bleeding from his shoulder and mouth. Liam stands above him, panting._ _

__“Everybody clear out,” Sheriff Stilinski orders. “We’ll have a town meeting about this later.” He turns to the recent intakes. “You’re staying,” he says softly. “Go with Ken. He’ll find you housing and get you settled.”_ _

__“Does this mean we’re finally getting rid of this fucking toerag?” Liam mutters, giving Logan a light kick to the ribs._ _

__“Yes,” Mrs. McCall says softly._ _

__Stiles rubs his head. “Man, Liam,” he murmurs. “I know we don’t always see eye to eye, but dude… you just set the "don’t fuck with me” bar really, _really_ high.“_ _

__Liam shakes his head. "I’ve wanted to clock him for so fucking long,” he mutters moodily. “He really had it coming. Hope I broke his jaw. Least that way he’ll stop talking shit.”_ _

__Four of the wall scouts move Logan to the infirmary; Brett stands up properly and approaches Liam, only just recovering from having his life seriously threatened. He feels shaken, but Liam’s hands are as steady as a rock. He didn’t want to kill Logan, just hurt him._ _

__Liam looks up as he approaches. “You okay?” he asks softly._ _

__Brett nods, struggling to find his voice. “You… how come you didn’t tell me?” he murmurs._ _

__Liam shakes his head. “I was trying to protect you,” he says. “You know, make sure you were safe. That you felt safe. Less you knew, the less likely Logan was to come after you. He needed to think we weren’t a threat.”_ _

__“I’m not,” Brett says. “Looks like he was right to worry about you though.”_ _

__Liam shrugs. “He had it coming.” It’s a true measure of how much Liam really hates Logan that he doesn’t seem to feel even remotely guilty for hurting him. He’s right, though - Logan’s buildup of bad karma was gonna get him eventually. It just so happens that he was got by a five-foot-five apocalypse hermit with anger issues._ _

__“What now?” Liam asks._ _

__Brett looks to the walls; Logan’s out of the picture, and the townspeople, by the looks of it, are only concerned that their leader was kind of a nutjob, and not that he’s gone. There’ll be some sort of trial and punishment, Brett’s sure. But they won’t be around to see it._ _

__“Now we go to DC,” Brett says._ _


	26. Chapter Twenty Six - Oculum Pro Oculo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> New chapter, as promised, Monday morning ^_^ I hope you guys enjoy!

**Chapter Twenty Six - Oculum Pro Oculo**

“How’s it looking?”

Brett looks up. Liam’s sitting on the exam table, jeans off, his boxers pushed up to give Brett access to his stitches. The only other thing he’s wearing is a plain white t-shirt.

He looks back down at Liam’s stitches; they look a little red and irritated, but the skin isn’t warm, and Liam doesn’t have a fever. It’s likely Liam’s just been doing too much running around on them lately.

“You gotta be more careful with them,” he admonishes gently, and Liam winces, like he saw that coming. “I’m serious. We’ll put a cold compress on them tonight - they look red. Are they itchy? Painful?”

“No, and a little, but not anything out of the ordinary.”

“Okay.” Brett grabs a fresh bandage and begins taping it down to the cut. “Just to be careful. You can’t get another infection.”

Liam nods. “I know. I’m sorry, I’ll be more careful.”

“Good.” Brett leans back and smiles tiredly when he’s done. “Okay, you’re good to go.”

Liam wriggles off the table. “Thank you, Dr. Talbot,” he says innocently.

Brett rolls his eyes. “I don’t have a lollipop for you.”

Liam grins widely and looks pointedly down at Brett’s pants.

“Jesus, Liam.” But he can’t help but laugh, even if it does sound exhausted; he’s been pulling long shifts in order to help out the people that were brought in by Liam. Some of them require round-the-clock care. Brett doesn’t want to think about what would’ve happened to them had Logan got his way.

“How’s Logan?” he asks.

“Still a piece of shit,” Liam says cheerfully. “And I’m still not allowed to set him loose in a pack of zombies.”

Liam’s job, the last few days, has been to guard Logan, who’s locked up in some sort of makeshift prison. Brett’s been by a few times; Logan’s act has dropped completely, and he’s inordinately and understandably pissed off about being outsmarted by an eighteen year old. Still, Brett knew right from the start not to fuck with Liam; he doesn’t know why it takes so long for it to set in for everyone else.

“Well. Right to a fair trial,” Brett says.

“Not like anyone can sue me for misconduct if he did so happen to just… accidentally end up as zombie chowder,” Liam mutters.

“C'mon. We don’t do that. We aren’t like that.”

“Aren’t we? You might not be. He was gonna switch off your life support, Brett. Someone had to be near your room all hours of the night and day. And he’s straight-up said he’ll kill me if he gets outta that cage.”

“He’ll have to go through me first,” Brett says darkly.

“Yeah, and uh, he’s perfectly willing to do that.” Liam pulls his jeans up, wincing. “Fuck. Having an injured leg is a pain in the ass.”

Brett nods. “Stay off it for a while,” he advises quietly. “Seriously. Go home and read a book or something.”

Liam sighs. “I’m not good at sitting still,” he mumbles.

“Go find Savannah and Zack then. Have a tea party. Or whatever it is kids do.”

“Zack would never have a tea party. He’s a fucking pirate, dude.”

“He doesn’t have the hook to prove it yet,” Brett chuckles. “Go on, get outta here. I’ll be leaving soon.”

He finishes his shift up about an hour later and leaves the hospital. When he exits, the first thing he sees is Liam, swarmed by small children, being chided for his lack of knowledge on how to play hopscotch. Savannah’s there, along with two of the new kids, some of the original inhabitants of River’s End, and - standing reluctantly in line, Zack.

Brett smiles. Zack pretty much hero-worships Liam, and would likely follow him anywhere - even if that means playing hopscotch with a bunch of little kids.

Before they go home, they have to drop the kids off; their parents left them in Liam’s care happily, which makes Brett’s heart swell with pride, really.

The brother and sister are first, then three of the others, until they’re just down to Zack and Savannah. By the time they get to Savannah’s house, Liam’s piggybacking her, and she’s asleep with her head between his shoulders.

Liam carries her upstairs and puts her to bed before they escort Zack home. He talks animatedly about anything and everything, but when Liam speaks, he shuts up and listens, wide-eyed and adoring. Liam doesn’t seem to notice.

“Zack’s your number one fan,” Brett says when they enter their house.

Liam turns. “What?”

“You haven’t noticed? He hangs off every word you say. It’s cute.”

Liam blushes a little. “He’s a good kid.”

Brett nods. “Do they know anything about Logan yet?” he asks.

Liam shakes his head. “Not enough. He’s only told us that the bomb was built to keep people away from the community. You know, with the idea that they’d crawl into the truck for shelter, and… you know. Boom.”

“He didn’t even know people would come that way,” Brett says blankly.

Liam shakes his head. “He left one at every road that leads here,” he says softly. “That’s all he’s told us so far. Mal and the rest of the team have been out and detonated them with snipers.”

“You didn’t go?” Brett asks.

Liam shakes his head, sinking onto the arm of the couch. “They wanted me to stay here. Watch Logan. Teach people how to hunt.”

So they’ll be ready for when we leave, Brett muses. He turns to the front door; a pile of bags and boxes is sitting just behind it, filled with their things. They’re leaving soon; he’s not really sure when, just that it’ll be within the week.

Liam follows his gaze. “Are you sad to go?” he asks quietly.

“Yeah. I’ll miss everyone. And, you know… feeling safe. It’s not out there.”

Liam nods. “I’m gonna miss having a bed,” he muses. “And knowing where my food is coming from. And… if one of us gets hurt? We’ve always been able to just go down to the infirmary, and we won’t be able to do that anymore.”

“You’ve got me,” Brett says with a smile.

Liam returns it, but it’s not sincere. “And what about you? I don’t know anything about medicine.”

“We’ll give you a crash course,” Brett promises him quietly. “In medical treatment. Just in case.”

“Okay. I’ll give you one in survival.”

“Sounds good.”

~*~

Two days later, after it becomes apparent that Logan isn’t going to give anything else up concerning his motives - not that he needs to; Brett’s fairly sure they’re on the mark about him wanting to start a fight - the council gets together to decide what to do with him.

Sheriff Stilinski is the one who delivers the news to them. Liam’s napping when he arrives; Brett swears his presence must wake Liam up, because within a minute of the guy arriving on their doorstep, Liam’s padding down the hallway in one of Brett’s t-shirts and his boxers. If Sheriff Stilinski feels odd about that, he doesn’t say anything.

“Logan’s been sentenced,” he says softly; Liam perks up, even though he’s still leaning on Brett sleepily. “Exile.”

“That’s a bad idea,” Liam says, almost straight away.

“We know.” He looks stressed, Brett realises sadly; it’s gotta be rough for him, making decisions that are going to affect everyone’s wellbeing. “But we don’t kill, Liam. So we’re going to drive him out as far as we can, blindfolded, and leave him somewhere.”

“Maybe you should make an exception to the no-kill thing,” Liam says.

“I tried arguing that. The rest of the council won’t have it. Exiling him that far out is essentially sentencing him to death anyway.”

“I’ll do it,” Liam says.

Brett’s head turns so fast a bolt of pain shoots up it; he winces, looking down at Liam. Liam doesn’t just look serious about the offer - he looks livid.

“You’re eighteen years old,” Sheriff Stilinski says softly. “You’re barely more than a kid. We aren’t letting you kill anyone. And that’s not the only reason, either.”

“He’s going to cause trouble,” Liam says. “If you exile him? He’s gonna come back.”

“He won’t be able to find his way.”

Liam breaks away from Brett’s side and walks away, shaking his head. Fudge trots after him; Brett hears the bedroom door slam.

He turns to Sheriff Stilinski, feeling sort of like he’s about to… well, try to explain his irritable teenager’s behaviour. “Sorry,” he says. “He’s kind of strung out. I’m sure he’ll get it eventually.” He’s not, but he feels obligated to say it.

Sheriff Stilinski shakes his head. “If I had my way… well, we’d do a little more than exile him.” He sighs. “Look, there’s another reason I came.”

“Yeah?”

“You and Liam are being sent to DC in about a day’s time,” he says quietly. “We’ve got a station wagon ready for you. We just wanted to give you time to say goodbyes.”

Brett’s throat tightens; he nods wordlessly, shakes Sheriff Stilinski’s hand, and retreats inside, shutting the door.

_We might never see any of these people again_ , he realises. _Whether it’s because they die or we die or we just never cross paths. If something happens to them, we’ll never know. And if something happens to us… they won’t even know to look._

He goes into the bedroom. Liam’s sitting on the bed, taking his frustration out on a pad of paper in his lap. When Brett enters, he looks up; his expression is set into a mutinous glare, one Brett hasn’t been on the receiving end of for a very long time.

“Liam,” he says softly.

“It’s a fucking stupid idea!” Liam spits. “If they let him go he’s gonna find a way to come back here and wreck everything! He already tried it when he didn’t have a reason to!”

“I know,” Brett says, sitting on the bed. “I believe you.”

Liam’s face softens a little. “You do?”

“Of course I do. I’m on your side, remember?”

Liam takes a deep, shuddering breath. “Yeah,” he breathes out. “Yeah, I know. Sorry.”

“It’s okay.” Brett shuffles a little closer; he seems to have diffused an episode before it had the chance to gather steam, and that’s progress. “Look, Liam… we don’t kill here. Isn’t that what you said? That we can’t just kill people?”

“This is different,” Liam pleads. “There’s an exception to every rule, right? Logan’s the exception. He’s dangerous. He threatened to kill me when he was locked up, Brett.”

“Are you scared?”

“Not for me! I’m scared for everyone else. And - and he threatened to switch off your life support when you were out.”

Brett flinches. He’d almost forgotten. “I get it,” he says. “But he’s not a threat to me anymore-”

“He’s a threat to everyone!” Liam yells. “Why aren’t you listening to me?”

Brett grabs Liam’s arms, gently, swallowing. “I am,” he whispers, trying to soothe the anger out of Liam’s face. He hates it when Liam’s angry; not because it’s aimed at him, but because Liam’s anger is a symptom of fear. “I am listening to you. I know he’s a threat. That’s why he’s been exiled.”

Liam swallows. “It’s not enough,” he whispers back.

“It’s gonna have to be, baby.”

~*~

Brett’s not sure which is worse - that when they say their goodbyes the next day, Kira cries, or that Liam does while he cuddles Lori to his shoulder.

He’s seen Liam cry before, sure. But not like this - not with a baby clutched to his shoulder like it’s the last time he’ll ever get to hold her. Brett remembers that Lori spent the first night of her life curled against Liam’s chest, in his arms, and suddenly, he wants to abandon Liam here. That baby is gonna need him. They all are.

“I wish there was some way we could keep in touch,” Kira sniffles.

“Me too.” Brett steps back; Kira’s only just relented and let him go. “We’re taking one of the radios, though. If we make it back here-”

“When,” Kira says tremulously. “Don’t say if.”

“Yeah, man.” Even Scott’s eyes are a little red and watery. “You and Liam, you’re gonna be fine. You always have been before, right?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I suppose-”

“Take her,” Liam mumbles to Kira. “Before I drown her with tears.”

There’s a muted, collective laugh at that. Kira takes Lori back; Brett puts his finger near her hand, as she grasps it, staring at him with soft brown eyes. She’s definitely Scott and Kira’s kid, alright.

Stiles claps Liam on the shoulder. “Well,” he says awkwardly. “I know we don’t always get along-”

“We never get along,” Liam points out, wiping his eyes, and Stiles smiles.

“But we’re gonna miss you. I guess. Without you, Scotty and I wouldn’t be-”

Scott coughs pointedly, and Stiles stops in the middle of what’s quickly becoming a run-on sentence. “Anyway,” he says. “You’ll be fine. You’re harder to get rid of than your average cockroach. And Brett’s got common sense, so-”

Brett stops paying attention after that; Malia’s standing next to him. “We have the other radio,” she says softly. “One of us is gonna have it. All the time. We packed you extra batteries.”

“Thanks,” he says softly.

She nods, staring at him, and then gives him a hug. It’s tight, sincere, not like her usual awkward attempts at physical contact, and she holds on for a long time. She’s tall enough that she barely has to stretch.

“Take care of Liam,” she whispers. “Please? Don’t let him get hurt.”

“I will. I’m going to.”

He gets it. Liam can take care of himself - more than anyone else here can, probably. But Liam’s been the youngest member of Malia’s scouting team for months now, and the most reliable. He saw how guilty she looked when Liam was injured during their last run together. He doesn’t blame her for wanting to make sure he’ll take care of Liam, even if it is a given.

The rest of the goodbyes go quickly. Tamara gives Liam a tight hug, strokes his hair and his back like he’s a sick child looking for comfort. Liam lets her.

Sheriff Stilinski shakes their hands; the kids all cry, even Zack, even though he tries not to. Liam promises to bring a hook back for him. Liam’s confidence that they’ll be alright makes it easy for Brett to believe as well.

After that, they’re off. Brett pretends not to notice Liam sniffling in the front seat of the car; he’s got his face turned away, a clear indication that he would like Brett to ignore him.

It’s just them now. Them and Fudge, who’s panting in the backseat, dozens of supplies, and a tent.

They drive for almost an hour before Liam seems to finally relax and perk up a little. Brett clears his throat; he’s happy to talk if Liam wants to.

“This is weird.”

Liam smiles at him. He seems fairly relaxed, considering how worried he was about leaving the safety of River’s End.

“It’s okay though,” Liam replies. “Still together.”

“Yeah.” Brett nods; he’s happy about that. He’s driving, Liam’s sitting cross-legged in the passenger seat, and Fudge is panting in the back.

They’ve been given enough supplies to last them a month if everything goes according to plan. Food - Liam’s going to have to hunt at some point, because they left all the meat at River’s End for people who needed it more - clothes, blankets, medical supplies - even bags of saline solution and clean needles in case of an emergency.

Brett looks at Liam. Before they left, Brett got a crash-course in survival from Liam and Malia, and Liam got a crash-course in medicine from Brett and Tamara. Hopefully, if anything happens to Liam, Brett will be able to hunt - and if anything happens to Brett, Liam will know enough to save his life. That’s the idea, anyway.

“Remember it took you like… two or three months to tell me your last name?” Brett asks.

Liam smiles, looking down. “C'mon. You can hardly judge me for that.”

“I can. What was I gonna do, Google you?”

Liam laughs. “Wouldn’t have found much, except maybe my dorky high school lacrosse team photo.”

“Damn. Would’ve paid good money to see that.”

“Fuck off.” Liam’s still smiling though. Brett’s beginning to think that - removed from stressful, life-or-death situations and given coping mechanisms for his PTSD - Liam might actually be a naturally cheery, if somewhat awkward person. It is hard to say; Brett obviously didn’t know Liam before the outbreak, and he still doesn’t know much about what Liam was like Before, but Liam seems to have a genuinely sweet, loving nature under all his shyness.

Not that Liam would ever admit to that, of course. He seems to have avoided a lot of the toxic masculinity Brett grew up with, particularly in his later teenage years, but Liam’s still adamant that there’s nothing sweet or loving about him. The comment is usually followed up with a reproachful, “Dick,” and a raised middle finger.

“So,” Liam says. “What about you, huh? What would Google have told me about you?”

“You already know about my rat tit, my tequila adventures, the sheets I stole off my friend’s washing line, and my girlfriend breaking up with me while I was fucking her,” Brett says. “What more mortifying things could you possibly want to know?”

Liam laughs, long and hard. “Oh, man,” he giggles. “You know what? I might not get to go to college. But at least I’ll never make any decisions like that.” He straightens up, smiling. “Okay, okay. Never have I ever.”

“This is usually a drinking game,” Brett points out.

“I don’t give a fuck,” Liam says cheerfully. “First person to ten gives the other a blowjob.”

“Well, if there’s a blowjob at stake, I’m in.”

“Okay, okay.” Liam turns to Brett and holds up his fingers. “Lower a finger every time you’ve done it.”

“I have played this, you know. With shots. And regret.”

“Alright. Never have I ever…” Liam’s eyes roll up to the roof of the car, like he’s carefully considering what he might say next. “Never have I ever watched porn with someone else.”

Brett splutters. “You know you usually ease into this, right?”

Liam grins. “Go hard or go home.”

Brett sighs and says, “Consider my finger lowered, then.”

“You sick fuck,” Liam says delightedly. “What’d you watch? With who?” He grins evilly. “I bet it was MILF porn. You said you had a thing for older girls.”

“You would’ve been a sexual deviant if you’d been given the opportunity to explore with porn,” Brett says mournfully. “It wasn’t MILF porn. It was regular porn. With my best friend. It was really fucking awkward and I still get chills thinking about it, so - next.”

“It’s your turn,” Liam says - Brett notices he’s still got all ten fingers raised.

“Never have I ever…” He actually does have to stop and think. “Fuck. We usually Googled the questions. Okay. Never have I ever ridden a horse.”

Liam lowers a finger, smiling.

“Really?”

“I grew up in Texas. We lived kind of out far, near a farm. I liked horse riding.”

“That’s cool,” Brett says, surprised. “Okay. Your turn. Give me a fun one.”

Liam grins. “Never have I ever puked on myself while drunk.”

“Nope,” Brett counters. “On someone else, sure, but not myself.”

“That’s worse,” Liam laughs.

“If you say so. Never have I ever had sex in my friend’s bed. With someone other than my friend.”

Liam, looking guilty as sin, lowers a finger. Brett’s jaw drops. “Liam!” he exclaims.

“I was fourteen!” Liam protests. “And ten months! And Garrett and I were curious and - do you know how few options there are for places to fuck when you aren’t out and shouldn’t be having sex anyway?”

Brett laughs. “Whose bed was it? Mason’s?”

“No,” Liam mumbles.

“Whose? C'mon. I mean, surely he was just glad you got laid, right?”

Liam winces. “It… was a girl’s bed.”

“Oh, and you were getting stuck into me for MILF porn!”

“We changed the sheets and everything,” Liam says pleadingly.

“Uh huh. Sure. Sure.”

Liam huffs. “Never have I ever… ended up naked and can’t remember why.”

“Oh, fuck you,” Brett says moodily, and Liam bursts into a fit of giggles as he lowers a finger for Brett. “You knew that was true for me, didn’t you?”

“Hey, you were the one with a raging alcohol problem, not me.”

“I didn’t have an alcohol problem, I was a fucking college student.”

They play for a little longer, but soon enough, Liam’s beginning to fall asleep in the front seat of the car. Brett smiles as he kicks his legs up onto Brett’s lap, closes his eyes, and is promptly unconscious. Even Fudge is sleeping in the back seat, snoring.

It hasn’t been just them for a really long time. Brett stares out the windshield at the sun, which is beginning to drop lower and lower. They’ll have to find somewhere to pull over soon enough. There’s no point in either of them driving through the night.

He drives until the sun is directly ahead of them, hoping to get as close to a town as possible. Eventually, he sees a sign - indicating that the next one isn’t too far away - and slows down, looking for a safe spot in the tree line to pull over.

When he stops, he cranks the window down and listens intently. He can’t hear any zombies, but…

Liam stirs next to him. “We stopping?” he croaks.

“Yeah. Have some water.” It’s warm out; he doesn’t want Liam to get dehydrated or sick. Liam might be smaller than him and need a little less of everything to keep going, but he also does the majority of the grunt work.

“Thanks.” Liam drinks, looking around. “Few hours of daylight left. Might go hunting. Trees like this, there’s bound to be something around.”

“Okay.”

They climb out; Liam takes his crossbow and a machete, scouring the area for zombies. He orders Fudge to stay with Brett, and the dog does - he whines a little when Liam leaves, wandering about twenty feet away, sniffs, and then comes back, settling down at Brett’s feet with his ears drooping.

“He’ll be back,” Brett promises. “I know you’ve got separation anxiety, but I’m telling you the truth.”

Liam’s gone for almost an hour; Brett’s unloaded the back of the station wagon, moved everything to the back seat, and gotten their bed for the night set up before he realises Liam isn’t back. Still, Fudge doesn’t seem worried, and if something happens…

Brett’s stomach lurches. Something could have already happened; Liam could be dead or hurt or bitten out there, or in pain, and Brett wouldn’t know, because if he was, he probably wouldn’t come back. He wouldn’t risk drawing anything back to Brett.

“Reckon he’s okay?” he asks Fudge quietly. Fudge huffs sadly.

“Right.” Brett starts getting the fire going, resolving that if Liam’s not back by the time he’s done, he’s going to go looking for him.

He doesn’t have to. He’s just setting the kindling on fire when Liam enters their little campsite. He’s panting, dripping in sweat, cheeks flushed with exhaustion - and he’s dragging a moderately sized deer behind him.

“Sorry,” he pants. “Found one.”

“You look wrecked,” Brett says, startled. “How far did you go?”

“Dunno.” Liam drags the deer to the fire and drops to the ground exhaustedly. “Got food though.”

“Yeah.” Brett hands Liam a bottle of water; he needs to replace all the fluid he’s lost through sweating. “Why don’t you drink that and go clean off in the river? I’ll start prepping the meat.”

“Okay.”

Once the sun begins to set properly, they retire to the station wagon. Fudge joins them, but not for very long before deciding it’s too hot in there and lying down under the car instead, where it’s cooler. Liam strips out of his shirt within five minutes; Brett never had one on in the first place.

“This is looking good.” He puts his hand against Liam’s side gently, where the scar is. “You can barely see it anymore. Does it still hurt?”

“Never,” Liam says with a small smile. He rolls onto his side, faces Brett; he’s got a smattering of dark stubble on his cheeks and jaw, and his eyes, when Brett looks, are softly heated. He likes where this is going.

“You remember that time you fingered me in the car?” Liam asks innocently.

Brett swallows; all the blood in his body rushes south. “Yeah. I remember.” Liam goes from zero to one hundred real quick; Brett sometimes has trouble keeping up with it, but hey, it’s a small price to pay for a ridiculously hot boyfriend with a high sex drive.

“Well, you should do it again. Except this time don’t stop at fingering.” Liam sits up, swings his leg over Brett’s hips.

Brett groans as Liam rolls his hips down into Brett’s, rubbing the hard line of his erection. “What’s in it for me?” he asks weakly, mostly just because he needs to keep up the facade of being in control - even when Liam’s got Brett totally wrapped around his little finger, and probably knows that too, judging by the smirk on his face.

Liam looks at him, considering. Then, “I’ll ride you.”

Brett’s brain pretty much short-circuits. “You’ll ride me?” He loves getting ridden - loved the way his girlfriend used to do it, and the idea of Liam doing it is sinfully hot.

“Yeah. But.” Liam smirks. “You have to score a perfect ten out of ten before I do.”

“Tell me what to do,” Brett whines, pulling Liam down. “I’m an honour roll student.”

“I can’t tell you what to do. It’s a test. You’ve just gotta-”

Brett flips them over so Liam’s beneath him; Liam’s grinning when he looks up, but he also looks flushed. Brett knows that scored him a point, because Liam’s almost always down for being tossed around like that.

“Remember the test material,” Liam whispers.

“I remember the material,” Brett says. “Keep me updated on the points?”

“Sure.” Liam’s wriggling his hips, almost happily, as Brett unbuckles both their belts, then yanks Liam’s jeans and boxers down. He thinks back, way back, to every individual time he’s made Liam come - every position that made Liam a little louder than usual.

“Knees,” he says, and Liam scrambles up obligingly. With Liam on his hands and knees - he turns to look at Brett questioningly - Brett slicks up his middle finger with lube, then presses against Liam’s entrance.

Liam shivers helplessly, and Brett kisses the small of his back as he pushes his finger in. He knows enough by now to know how to avoid Liam’s sweet spot - so Liam won’t come until Brett wants him to. Still, Liam’s dick is stiff between his legs, half-hard, looking interested.

Brett quirks his finger, moves it tantalisingly slowly. Liam’s hands clench the sheets.

“Two,” he whispers.

“Two for two, huh? I’m doing well.” He strokes Liam’s thigh, lets him adjust to the first finger, before adding a second one. Liam’s body accepts it fairly easily; Liam whimpers quietly.

“You trying to be quiet?” Brett asks.

“Maybe,” Liam murmurs back.

“Why? There’s no one out here, and I like it when you’re loud.” He pushes all the way in, curls his fingers, and just brushes Liam’s prostate, once, before he moves away from it. Liam moans, sounds frustrated.

“Three. And four. I guess.” The last is said reluctantly, like Liam would’ve given him a bonus point had he continued. Still, he’s only got six to go, which is good, because his dick is pretty hard and wanting to be buried inside Liam right about now.

He reaches around with his other hand and grips Liam’s cock gently. Liam gasps, pushing into his palm, but Brett’s hold on him is so light it only causes Liam to make a noise of frustration.

“Five,” Liam whines.

“Halfway there.”

“Mm, yeah. Hurry up and finish your test.”

Brett pauses. Then he nudges a third finger at Liam’s entrance; Liam’s thighs start to tremble, and Brett pushes gently. He hasn’t been prepping Liam for long, and this might be a fun game, but it won’t be if Liam ends up hurt for it.

“ _Six_ ,” Liam moans.

Brett smiles smugly. Liam thought this’d be a fun game, but Brett’s the one who’s gonna come out on top… literally and figuratively. He curls his fingers towards Liam’s prostate.

“Seven!” Liam yelps. “Seven, seven, fuck-”

“I can’t believe you’re still counting,” Brett breathes. “You like this?” He gives Liam’s dick a brief squeeze; Liam’s rock solid underneath him. “Like being bent over like this? Like that I’m in complete control of you?”

“Eight,” Liam whispers faintly.

“Really? What for?”

“I like it when you talk like that.”

Brett thinks. He’s got two points left; Liam’s obviously still keeping count and isn’t relenting, so he does seem to expect Brett to finish. After a moment’s hesitation, he lets go of Liam’s dick - hoping he can’t be docked points - and uses that hand to scratch Liam’s back, all the way from his shoulders to the base.

“Nine,” Liam gasps. “You know what? Ninety percent is still a good average. Roll over.”

Brett’s not going to argue; he pulls out and rolls onto his back. His dick is so hard it almost hurts; he watches eagerly as Liam grabs the lube and pops the cap on it. He’s flushed from the chest up, breathing hard.

“Do I get extra credit for this?” Brett asks innocently.

“For lying on your back and letting me do all the work? No.” Liam slicks him up carefully, reaches behind himself to put a little more at his entrance too. “Okay, just - don’t thrust up, alright?”

“Okay.” Brett reaches up, holds onto Liam’s hips, and watches as Liam rises onto his knees, positions Brett beneath him, and then begins to slide down.

_Don’t thrust up. Don’t thrust up_. But it’s so hard; Liam’s tight and hot and wet and he’s chewing on his lower lip, breathing out shakily, slowly easing himself down. His legs are shaking; Brett takes more of Liam’s weight on his arms, and Liam lets him.

“Fuck,” Liam breathes shakily.

“You’re okay?”

“Yeah. Been a while since I did this.”

“You poor old thing,” Brett teases, but it’s gentle, and Liam smiles at him. His eyes are a little tight around the edges, like maybe it’s hurting him a little. “Come down here.”

Liam leans over him carefully, and Brett meets him in a kiss, making sure he’s still supporting Liam’s weight on his hands and forearms. He can feel Liam sinking down still, slowly, and holds his hips still even as he’s aching to jerk them upwards into Liam’s heat.

“Liam,” he murmurs against Liam’s mouth. “I love you.”

He opens his eyes to find Liam smiling at him; the tenseness is gone from his eyes. “You’re supposed to say that after we finish,” he whispers, like there’s someone else around who might hear them. “Not during.”

He sits down fully; Brett takes the opportunity to run his hands up and down Liam’s sides, round to his shoulder blades; to press his thumbs into the narrow, swift cut of Liam’s hips where they join his thighs. He marvels in the heady sensation of Liam sitting astride him, clenching and unclenching as he acclimatises to Brett inside him.

“I don’t care about your shitty romance movie stereotypes,” Brett says, and Liam bursts into a fit of breathless, slightly strained giggles. “Now who’s fucking it up? Laughing during sex?”

Liam pitches forward onto his knees properly, shifting the weight from Brett’s hips to his own legs and sliding up a little, giving Brett some leverage. “I won’t be if you start proving you belong in the AP class,” he murmurs.

“We’re still going with this test thing? Okay.” Brett pulls his hips back, then pushes forward; Liam’s right hand goes to the side of the station wagon, holding on with a white-knuckled grip, and his left lands on his dick. His eyes are closed, and he’s biting his lip again.

“You okay, Li?” Brett asks softly.

“Just a bit - I dunno. Hard to take sometimes from here. I’m okay.”

“Do you wanna stop?”

“I’ll fail you if you stop.”

“That would ruin my perfect GPA, though.”

Liam giggles again. “Stop making me fucking laugh, you prick.”

Brett gives another slow thrust, and Liam’s hips seem to turn to liquid metal at the sensation; he melts against Brett, and his hand moves from the side of the car to Brett’s chest, forcing him down. Brett holds his waist to steady him.

Liam catches his eyes; his mouth is open and kissed red and puffy. “You can move faster,” he whispers. “I’m okay.”

“Don’t have to tell me twice.” He groans as Liam sits back into it, then rolls his hips forward. He’s had practice; Brett wouldn’t ever be able to move like that, he doesn’t think. “How long does it take you to come like this?”

“Not long,” Liam moans, rolling his hips quickly. “Really not long.”

Brett grunts; Liam’s putting a lot of weight on his arm, which is still braced on his chest by the palm of his hand. Liam’s not all that heavy, at least not like this - but he is strong, and Brett feels like the air’s being forced out of him.

He grabs Liam’s waist, crooks his legs a little, so that Liam’s forced to sit forward. “Come here,” he groans, pulling on Liam’s waist - the narrowest part, where his hands fit perfectly and look huge. “Come here, I’ve got you.”

Liam leans forward; Brett arches up to kiss him, starts thrusting a little harder and faster, holding Liam still with what’s probably a brutally tight grip on his ribs.

Liam breaks away from his mouth. “Fuck,” he moans. “Fuck, Brett, oh, God-”

“Good?”

“Yeah, yes, _yes_ -”

Brett revels in the way Liam squeezes his eyes shut, mouth open; in the next second, he’s leaning back, jerking his hips in time with Brett’s thrusts. Brett moves to hold the backs of his thighs instead; Liam tosses his head back, exposing the column of his throat.

Brett risks letting go of Liam’s left side and reaches down; his cock is leaking and unattended on Brett’s stomach, and he can’t have that. He takes it in his hand and gives it a gentle stroke, smearing the precome at the tip.

The noise that falls out of Liam’s mouth must easily rank in the top three most gratifying Brett’s ever experienced. His legs are shaking; he’s been doing most of the work, between supporting his own weight and moving in time with Brett, so-

“You want me to make you come?” Brett whispers.

“Yes,” Liam moans.

“Beg for it.”

Liam’s eyes fly open; Brett can’t say he’s surprised, because he wasn’t expecting to say that when he opened his mouth. He worries, for a moment, that he’s gone too far - that Liam’s going to be offended, or-

“Please,” Liam whimpers. “Please make me come.”

Brett groans, grabs Liam’s waist. “Jerk yourself off.”

Liam doesn’t need to be told twice; he starts jerking himself off as Brett holds him still and pounds into him, the effort searing the muscles in his thighs, glutes and hips like he’s halfway through an intense workout.

“Brett,” Liam says, and his voice rises, wavers, then breaks. “Brett-”

“Louder.”

“Brett, please, I’m gonna - I’m-”

“Okay,” Brett pants, tilting his head. “Go on. Come for me.”

Liam howls when he comes, so hard it almost reaches Brett’s neck; the rhythmic pulsing around his cock, along with Liam’s moans and whimpers of pleasure above him, send him over the edge as well. He slams up into Liam twice more before throwing his head back, clenching Liam’s sides as he comes inside him.

For a moment, they stay where they are. Liam lets his dick go and flops bonelessly against Brett’s chest; he’s panting hard, shaking almost as badly.

“Wow,” Brett breathes. Liam gives a weak, breathless giggle against him, and they’re quiet again. Brett closes his eyes, trying to remind himself not to fall asleep like this.

“Ten.”

Brett opens his eyes; Liam’s voice is muffled by his neck. “What?”

Liam lifts his head a little; he looks thoroughly and happily debauched as he smiles. “Ten,” he says. “Ten points. Congratulations, you made honour roll.”

It’s all Brett can do to laugh breathlessly. “What can I say? I’m an overachiever.”

Liam’s head is back against his neck; Brett feels him smile widely, then deliver an affectionate nibble of his earlobe. He shivers.

“You cold?” Liam asks.

“No. I’ve got a nice warm Liam blanket.” He knows Liam’s asking because ever since his coma, he’s had trouble retaining body heat. Being close to another human body is the only thing that helps, and Liam - well, Liam’s more than happy to oblige him.

“C'mon,” Brett murmurs, lifting his hips a bit; Liam whines. “Get up. Let’s get some sleep.”

“My legs are jelly,” Liam complains.

“Mm, I know. Get off and I’ll clean you up.”

“Okay, okay…”

~*~

“ _BRETT!”_

His first thought upon waking is that he must be dreaming, but it only takes him a few disoriented seconds a swift kick to his ribs to realise he isn’t - that Liam’s howling with fear next to him, thrashing with it, soaked in sweat and-

“ _Brett!”_

Brett lurches into a sitting position, grabs Liam’s shoulders to try and hold him still. The noises Liam makes sound like they’re being wrenched from the throat of a man who’s dying and petrified - for all Brett knows, in Liam’s nightmare, he might be.

“Liam, wake up,” he pleads. “It’s okay, it’s just me, it’s okay-”

“Brett!”

“Liam, I’m here,” he says helplessly, smoothing Liam’s damp hair off his forehead and trying to stop him from thrashing around. “I’m right here, wake up. C'mon, baby-”

Liam’s eyes open so suddenly, Brett forgets the end of his sentence. He stops moving; Brett releases his tight grip on him and sits back. He’s shaking so hard he’s not sure if it’s coming from him or Liam; Liam’s breathing like he’s just run for his life.

_He was having a nightmare and he was screaming for me_ , Brett realises faintly. _He was terrified and all he could think to do was scream for me_.

“Brett?” Liam moans, his voice scratched and breaking.

“It’s me,” Brett reassures him immediately. “I’m here.”

Liam wipes his eyes, rolls onto his side, and curls into a ball, trembling violently. Brett rolls up behind him and manages to get his arms around Liam - he’s never seemed smaller or fragile than in this moment, as he pushes towards Brett’s body and allows himself to be totally blanketed by Brett’s weight.

Brett moves his hand, rubs Liam’s back in figure eights. Liam’s soaked right through with sweat; it’s rolling down his neck and temples too. It must have been one hell of a nightmare; he’s never seen Liam this bad before, and he’s never heard him scream like that, either - not even when he’s been so badly hurt he’s unaware of his surroundings.

“Fuck,” Liam sobs. “Fuck.”

Brett rushes to pull him in closer; Liam’s legs are curled near his chest, and one of his hands is clutching Brett’s, the other gripping the arm around his waist tightly. Brett doesn’t even know how to tell him it’s okay; it clearly isn’t.

“Where are we?” Liam whimpers.

Brett’s stomach lurches. “We - we’re on our way to DC, remember?” he asks shakily. “We’re pulled over on the side of the road. Do you remember?”

There’s a pause. Liam nods.

Brett feels cold, sick. Liam’s sniffling wetly underneath his body weight, and he can feel tears dripping down onto his bicep.

_One night_ , he thinks blankly. _We’ve been out of River’s End for one night and he’s already started having nightmares. He’s not okay. Not even fucking close. Of course he isn’t. PTSD doesn’t just fucking go away on its own._

Liam lurches out of his arms and lunges for the back of the station wagon - the door is already open so that the car stays cool in the warm, wet heat of the night, and before Brett can follow him, Liam’s stumbling out and puking on a tree near the fire.

Brett hurries out after him. Liam’s never had a nightmare so bad he’s puked before, not even right after it happened. Is this just a buildup of all the stress he’s been under? Does he finally feel like he’s out of scrutiny’s way and can relax and let his walls down? Brett doesn’t know.

He rubs Liam’s back comfortingly, being mindful not to step in vomit. Liam’s breathing heavily, but after a moment, he straightens up. He wipes his mouth on the back of his hand, shakily, before turning to face Brett. He barely grazes Brett’s eyes before looking away, his cheeks wet and eyes red.

“Liam,” Brett murmurs, reaching out to stroke his arm.

“Mm.”

Brett moves up to massage the junction of Liam’s neck and shoulder, which always seems to calm him down. “It’s okay,” he says helplessly. “It was just a dream.”

Liam rubs his face. “Can’t believe I fucking puked,” he mumbles, obviously embarrassed.

“It’s been a weird day,” Brett replies, trying to reassure him. “It’s hot. You did a lot of walking.”

“I puked because I had a nightmare about that fucking Keeper getting what he wanted, not because it was fucking hot. I’m not a fucking pussy,” Liam snaps.

They stand in silence for a moment. Brett’s trying not to feel offended; Liam hardly ever lashes out at him anymore, and when he does, it’s because he’s scared shitless and too afraid to admit it to anyone, even himself. It’s not Brett. Any other person could stand right where Brett’s standing and receive exactly the same treatment.

Liam wipes his face shakily. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s-”

“It’s not okay,” Liam mutters. “I shouldn’t snap at you. You aren’t a fucking punching bag.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Brett says instead, and he means it. “Come on. Rinse your mouth out and come back to bed.”

Liam’s eyes flash angrily, but in the next second, the expression is gone, and his face is carefully, strategically blank again. Brett watches helplessly as Liam does as he suggested; he hasn’t dealt with snappy, moody, closed-off Liam in such a long time he feels like it’s not even his boyfriend he’s looking at. Like Liam’s a totally different person or something.

They climb back into the station wagon. Liam’s wound tighter than a spring; his hands are shaking, and when he lies down, his chest is rigidly still; he’s barely even breathing. It suddenly occurs to Brett that Liam might not want him around at all.

“I can sleep up front,” he offers quietly. “Give you some space.”

“Just gimme a second,” Liam mutters back. His voice is shaking too.

Brett lies on his side, almost as far from Liam as he can get, longing to reach out and touch him and reassure him somehow that everything’s alright. But Brett’s reality is different from Liam’s; he wasn’t almost raped, he hasn’t had to deal with being essentially alone for six weeks, and he didn’t spend a week listening to Logan’s threats. Liam’s clearly stressed. It’s not an emotion Brett typically sees from him, what with Liam generally being a stable person to be around. But that’s what it is.

Liam lowers his hands; they’ve been pressed against his face. He turns to Brett.

“What’re you doing over there?” he asks tiredly.

“Giving you space,” Brett replies softly.

Liam shakes his head. “I don’t want space. Come here. Please.”

Brett shuffles over to him, pulls the waffle blanket up over their legs. Liam’s trembling minutely. Brett pretends not to notice.

“Fuck, I’m such an asshole,” Liam mutters.

“You had a nightmare-”

“And I acted like a dick afterwards, stop making excuses for me. It’s not right or fair.” He takes a deep breath. “Just… talk to me or something. Please?”

“About what?” Brett questions softly.

“Anything.”

Brett talks. About everything that comes to mind; about his little sister and his mom (his dad is still a raw, painful subject, and not one he’s ready to touch on); about his college experience, even about his ex girlfriend, before moving onto to other things, like how it feels to be truly shitfaced; the buzz of a tattoo needle constantly whirring against your skin, the epic, unrelenting burn of the ink being injected into you at two to three thousand thousand pricks per minute; the resounding crunch you feel when your nose is broken in a game of lacrosse.

“I’m sorry,” Liam mumbles sleepily. “For snapping.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Brett says softly. “Sleep.”

“Okay.”

~*~

Liam wakes him up the next day with a crackling fire, a bowl of oatmeal, and a sheepish, guilty smile. Brett kisses him until he realises there’s nothing left to forgive. He’s just glad Liam’s alright; he never wants to hear him scream like that again. He’s probably never going to forget it, either.

The driving, as it turns out, isn’t so straightforward. It’s all well and good to have a map - and Liam, who can actually read the map - but the roads are filled with a myriad of obstacles, including but not limited to car wrecks, zombie pileups, fallen trees, and broken railings.

“This is gonna take us fucking ages,” Liam mumbles crankily. He’s got his glasses on, staring at the map moodily. “We’ve had to make so many detours…”

“Is there a town coming up?”

“Town slash smallish city. Why?”

“Let’s stop there. Get our bearings for a bit, loot some stuff. We aren’t really on a time crunch or anything, after all.”

“Sounds good,” Liam says, yawning a little. “Get to stretch our legs anyway, right?”

“… You can probably stretch yours completely if you just move your seat back a little, but yeah.”

“Fuck you, dude.” Liam pushes his glasses up, rubs his eyes. “God, you know, I was gonna get fucking eye surgery before all this. That Lasik shit? I was gonna do that. Wish Armageddon had just… you know… happened three years later.”

Brett smiles softly. “I like your glasses,” he says. “They look good on you. I know they aren’t all that appropriate for your badass apocalypse hermit outfit… but yeah. They look good on you.”

Liam’s mouth twitches reluctantly. “Shut up. Stop making me feel all fuzzy and shit.” He looks down at the map for a moment then, swallows. Brett hears his breathing hitch like he’s about to speak, but it takes him a moment to finally start.

“I… I’m sorry about last night, I…”

“Don’t be,” Brett says quickly. “You already said sorry. I wasn’t angry at you. I know you didn’t mean it.”

“I’m less worried about you being angry and more worried about you being hurt,” Liam says quietly. “I was just… really scared.”

Brett swallows. “I know. I know you were.”

“Thanks for being there. I don’t know what happened, I just-”

“You’re probably just a little stressed,” Brett says awkwardly. “Leaving River’s End, and all our friends, and our home… it probably just all came to a head last night. It’s over now.” He looks sideways; Liam’s picking at his cuticles. “You wanna talk about it more?” Brett asks slowly.

“It was Logan,” Liam murmurs, his eyebrows slanting a little.

“What was?”

“Instead of the Keeper. It was Logan.”

A shiver crawls up Brett’s spine. “Thank God we don’t have to ever see him again, then.”

Liam looks uncomfortable. Brett knows he doesn’t agree with Logan’s sentence, but he also knows Liam probably won’t bring it up again; it would be beating a dead horse.

“Right,” he says instead, and they keep driving.

~*~

They travel like that for almost a week; following the map, turning around when obstacles pop up. Liam marks them down just in case; he goes hunting every now and then, leaving most of the scavenging to Brett.

“Had to be Idaho,” Liam mutters.

“Huh?”

“It’s so flat and boring,” Liam groans, shifting in his seat and putting his feet up on the dashboard. “Seriously, I’d kill just to see a fucking bush.”

“Next time I’ll make our roadtrip more scenic,” Brett promises, and Liam grins at him.

They pull over at the next town. It’s more of a small city, really; the main road going in is unobstructed, which Liam makes a point to note down in red pen. He’s surprisingly good at keeping tabs on different roadblocks and figuring out the fastest routes; it isn’t a skill Brett’s seen in anyone under the age of forty, really.

“Idaho,” Liam mumbles, clearly irritated, as they head towards a huge apartment block. “Had to be fucking Idaho, huh?”

“What’ve you got against Idaho, baby?” Brett teases.

Liam huffs, but he’s starting to tint pink; calling him “baby” never fails to elicit a reaction like that. “It’s flat! And boring!”

“Plenty of states are.”

“Well, we happen to be in this one. Idaho, more like Idafuckoff.”

“I’m sure the people of Idaho are offended by that statement, Li.”

“The people of Idaho? What people of Idaho?” Liam turns in a circle, arms out. “There’s no one fuckin’ here. It’s a ghost town.”

“Yeah, let’s not pursue that tragic train of thought any further.”

Liam slips between a few cars. “What do you think they called themselves?” he asks.

“… Probably Americans?”

“But like. There’s Californians, and Floridians, and Minnesotans - and Texans, fuck - but what about people in Idaho?”

“Idahoans?”

“I got it,” Liam sniggers. “Hoes. They definitely called themselves Hoes.”

Brett stops and looks at him in wonderment for a moment. “I am actually dating a teenager,” he says, and Liam snickers louder. “I am completely in love with a teenager who still thinks hoe jokes are funny.”

“They are funny. Also, I’m suffering from arrested development, probably, so leave me alone,” Liam chuckles.

“You know you’re probably not the first person to have made that joke, right?”

“Right, right. But I am probably the last.”

“That’s a good point too,” Brett muses.

They’ve reached the second level of an apartment complex without incident, despite the fact that there are a surprising number of biters around; this was probably a lower socioeconomic area before, Brett realises - there are factories surrounding the area, and an industrial-sized Walmart, too.

“You wanna take that end?” Liam asks, motioning. “I’ll take this one. Meet back in five?”

“Sure. Be safe.”

“You too.” Liam even leans up to give him a quick peck on the lips before leaving; Brett watches him go with a little smile on his face.

The first apartment he checks has nothing in it, although it does confirm that this was definitely a bad area of town to live in. The second one yields a few bottles of water, which are almost as rare as gold.

He takes a cursory glance inside the third apartment; no zombies. They’re small, probably studios before all this, and it doesn’t take much for him to see there’s no danger. He enters slowly, still, his gun raised halfway.

Nothing. He’s just turning to leave when something - someone - grabs his wrists and twists so hard he cries out; the gun goes off, but it’s pointed at the floor, and the pain in his arm forces him to drop it.

Liam would’ve heard the gunshot, and that’s the only good thing about this scenario as Brett whirls around, barely managing to duck a huge, hairy fist coming straight for his face. Not that it matters; he ducks, but whoever it is, they’re bigger and stronger than him, and grabbing the back of his neck is enough to cause pretty severe pain in his spine.

“What are you doing here?” the man snarls. “Who are you with?”

“I’m not,” Brett chokes, then cries out as he’s slammed against the wall, pinned by his throat, and dragged up until only his toes touch the ground. He scrabbles for purchase, tries to kick - but if he lifts his legs, he puts pressure on his neck, and his vision dims.

“Who,” the man growls, “are you with?”

“No one,” Brett rasps. “I’m not.” He’s wearing a bandana; Brett can’t see his mouth or nose, only a set of dark, angry brown eyes beneath a shock of brown hair. The dude’s huge; he clearly hasn’t been suffering from lack of food.

Behind the door, Brett realises. He must have been behind the door. It was the only blind spot-

“Put me down,” he gasps. “I’m not gonna-”

He chokes as more of his airway is cut off. “You aren’t gonna do shit,” the guy rumbles. “That’s-”

The door flies open; Liam enters with his crossbow up and black, furious look on his face. “Drop him,” he growls. Fudge appears next to him, snarling, the fur on the back of his neck standing up.

The guy’s finally stopped roughing Brett up; he’s aware there’s a weapon pointed at his back. “Or?”

“Or I’ll put an arrow in the back of your head so fast you won’t have time to shit your pants,” Liam snarls back.

There’s a pause; the guy starts to turn, his hand still on Brett’s neck, Brett still struggling feebly. Liam’s probably got it covered, but it wouldn’t hurt to have his back, either.

The man’s hesitated too long; Liam steps closer, his lips curled back. “I said fucking drop him,” he hisses.

“Wait,” the guy says frantically; he’s holding out a hand. “Wait, is that - no, no, wait-” Liam’s stepping closer again, his crossbow at eye height, his hand on the trigger. “No, hang on - WAIT!”

“Drop him _now_ ,” Liam growls.

The guy pinning Brett to the wall lets him go, abruptly; Brett gasps in air, lowering his head to glare at the guy who attacked him - huge dude, built like a tank, even now, with a black beard poking out from under a bandana.

Liam, realising he has the upper hand now, advances, crossbow raised, eyes bright with fury. “Okay, listen-”

“Liam?” the bearded guy asks.

Liam stops in his tracks; Brett feels his heart stumble. Liam knows this guy? Upon inspecting Liam’s face, it sure as shit doesn’t seem like it - he looks blank and confused.

“ _Liam?_ ” The guy’s voice is totally incredulous. “Hey, is that you, buddy?”

The blank look is gone from Liam’s face, replaced with one of recognition. “Owen?” he asks tentatively.

The guy yanks the bandana off his nose and mouth, revealing both - and a smile. “Holy shit, Liam,” he says. “You’re fucking alive!”

Brett’s surprised to see Liam smile back, open-mouthed, like he can’t quite believe what he’s seeing. In the next second, he’s stepped closer, and they’re hugging tightly.

“You still have my crossbow,” the guy says happily.

“Hey, it’s my crossbow now.” Liam’s grinning. “Hi.”

“Hey.” He looks at Brett. “Oh, shit, man. I’m really sorry. If I’d known you were with Liam, I wouldn’t have roughed you up.”

“That’s… okay?” Brett asks hesitantly. What the fuck is going on?

“Brett, this is Owen,” Liam says, smiling as he comes over to Brett and helps him straighten up. “He was the one who taught me how to hunt and track and build fires and stuff.”

“He went to get Garrett medicine,” Brett remembers.

“That was me!” Owen says proudly. “Well, Vin as well. Holy shit! He’s gonna be so fuckin’ stoked to see you, Liam!” He looks around, slowly, like he might’ve missed something. “Garrett’s… not with you?”

There’s a brief flash of pain across Liam’s face; he looks down, shakes his head. Owen closes his eyes, puts a hand on Liam’s shoulder.

“I’m sorry, buddy.”

Liam smiles a little. “Thanks.”

“Look, I wanna know what happened, man, I really do,” Owen says. “But here’s probably not a good place, you catch me? We should get moving.”

“Yeah, what’s with all the zombies?” Liam asks. “Didn’t think-”

“No time, buddy. C'mon, let’s go.”

Brett’s not sure they should go with Owen. But Liam seems to trust him, and Brett trusts Liam, so he follows as Owen turns tail to leave the building.

It takes a few minutes to get outside, but eventually, they are - they jog back through the alleyway Brett and Liam originally entered through, and Brett takes comfort in the fact that Fudge is trotting loyally at Liam’s heels, not seeming worried about Owen at all.

Brett’s worried. Owen’s fucking huge, much bigger than Brett himself or Liam, who he completely dwarfs - he must be at least six foot six, seemingly covered in black hair on his arms, face, and chest, and a whole foot broader than Brett is. Is this how Liam feels standing next to him? Or, well, anyone?

Point being, if Owen isn’t trustworthy, Brett’s not going to be able to protect Liam, let alone himself.

“So,” Owen says. “What’s with the dog?”

“That’s Fudge,” Liam says. “I found him when I was out scouting. Got some glass out of his paw. He wanted to follow after that.”

“Fudge, huh? The dessert kind or the street drug kind?”

“What do you think?” Liam asks with a wry smile. “Brett, you okay?”

He’s been really quiet, he realises now. “I’m okay,” he says, watching Liam’s face relax minutely. “Hey, how far away are we?”

“Few minutes,” Owen assures him. “You guys got a camp setup?”

“Sort of,” Liam says.

“Okay, well, you can bring all your stuff if you want - join me and Vin. It’s just us.”

Liam opens his mouth to answer, then closes it and cuts a look to Brett. He appreciates being kept in the loop, knowing Liam was just about to make a decision on the spot.

“We’ll think about it,” Brett says.

Owen nods, like he understands why Brett’s so wary of him. “Well, until then - you wanna meet up with Vin?” The question is directed at Brett; Owen’s realised Liam has no hesitations. And Brett wants to warn Liam that Owen and Vinnie might not be the people he remembers from three years ago… but he feels like the words will fall on deaf ears.

“Yeah,” he says slowly.

“Okay. This way.”

They’re through the alley in no time, and Brett suddenly understands Owen’s urgency; he can hear walkers. Close by, if the groaning is any indication.

“Going single file,” Owen pants. “Li, you go in the middle.”

“No,” Liam says quickly. “I’ll bring up the back with Fudge.” He glances at Brett; this is about his hand, or something, and if it was just them, he’d argue - but he can’t without causing a scene, and so he follows Owen down the next alley. It’s incredibly narrow, and they have to climb over a few barricades.

“Fudge,” Liam whispers.

Fudge jumps up onto the last barricade carefully, and then down. Liam smiles and rubs his ears. “Good boy.”

Owen’s pushing the door to a warehouse building open, then heading upstairs to one of the office areas. Brett follows, listening to Liam’s jogging footsteps behind him, the skitter of Fudge’s claws on the concrete. They’re both okay.

At the top, Owen opens the door. “Vin!” he announces. “We have guests!”

The other man looks up. Brett’s surprised by his appearance; he’s pretty thin, gangly, a little taller than Liam but shorter than Brett, with lily-white skin, brown eyes, and shaggy, dirty-blonde hair. He looks kind of like a bunny in the headlights.

“Owen?” he asks softly.

“This is Brett,” Owen says, knocking Brett on the chest like he didn’t try to choke him to death fifteen minutes ago. “And - yo, where’s-”

Liam enters the room too, Fudge at his side; Fudge hates stairs, so that’s probably what Liam was doing - coaxing him up them.

Vinnie’s mouth opens, then closes. “Liam?” he whispers.

Liam smiles. “Hi, Vinnie.”

There’s a long pause; Vinnie takes a step back, then strides forward and hugs Liam tightly. Liam returns the gesture just as hard.

“Oh my God,” Vinnie murmurs. “Liam…” He steps back. “Are you okay? Are you hurt?”

Liam shakes his head with a smile. Vinnie’s eyes rake up and down his body; he smiles faintly. Brett’s definitely not imagining the way his eyes are misting over with tears or getting red.

“You grew,” he says.

“Yeah, a little,” Liam says shyly. “Um, this is Brett.”

“Brett.” Vinnie shakes his hand. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to ignore you. We just…”

“We haven’t seen Liam in fuckin’ years!” Owen says. “We thought for sure you were dead, buddy!”

“Not yet,” Liam says.

“But I bet that’s a story and a half, isn’t it?” Vinnie asks. Brett likes him much more than Owen already, based off five seconds of interaction; he’s softer and gentler, and he seems to really care about Liam.

“Look, you don’t know us,” Vinnie says, addressing Brett. “But it’d be nice to catch up with Liam again. Do you wanna stay here for the night?”

“It doesn’t even get hot,” Owen says hopefully.

Brett looks to Liam; his expression is neutral, but his eyes are hopeful. He smiles.

“Yeah. That sounds good.”

~*~

Vinnie and Owen are pretty well stocked on food, as it turns out.

They eat in silence for a little while, until they’re mostly full, until Vinnie says, “I still can’t believe you’re alive.”

Liam lifts his head. Brett can’t believe he is either, but probably for entirely different reasons. “Yeah,” he says. “I’m pretty surprised to see you guys too. I thought… after you didn’t come back with the medicine…”

Vinnie shakes his head. “It was bad luck,” he says. “That’s all.”

There’s another moment of silence, and then Owen clears his throat.

“So,” Owen says. “What happened, man? ‘Cause Vin and I, we went back for you, you know? When we could. Got stuck on a fucking roof. Fucking shit luck that was. When we got there, you and Garrett were gone, dude. Thought for sure you were dead.”

Liam smiles. “Thanks for going back for me. Well, I mean, we hung around for a day down there. But…” Liam shrugs, swallows. “Well, Garrett got worse. I’m sure you guys probably knew he was going to, so thanks for going to get him medicine. Anyway, he got worse, and nobody came back, and I didn’t want him to die down there. So I got him out of the sewers-”

“Atta boy,” Owen says, clapping Liam’s shoulder. “You’re good with maps. If anyone was gonna bust outta that hellhole, it was gonna be you.”

Liam nods, smiling a little. “Yeah, well. Got out. Went to an apartment. Garrett, uh - Garrett turned.” And here, there’s a moment of silence as Owen and Vinnie grow considerably more sombre and look at Liam sympathetically. And Liam, well - Liam seems to be trying to find the fight to continue.

“Garrett turned,” Liam repeats, his voice a little thick. “I put him down. He told me to go to Ashburton and that it was safer there. So I did. Stayed there for a year and a half, maybe, on my own. Just avoided people and survived, really. Eventually Brett came through looking for his friends, and he stayed.”

“You put Garrett down?” Vinnie asks quietly.

“Yeah. Someone had to.”

“I’m sorry you had to do that.” He sounds genuinely regretful. “We should have left someone with you.”

“It’s okay.” Liam shrugs. “Owen went out looking for you. I get it.”

Vinnie looks to Brett. “Did you ever find your friends?” he asks.

Brett shakes his head. “I wasn’t meant to stay long,” he says. “Liam got me out to one of the tunnels the next day, but it was full of zombies. By the time we’d figured out an alternative route, winter had hit full-force. He let me stay.”

“And now?”

Liam looks at Brett. “Things are different now,” Brett says. “I still want to find them, but we’re out here for a reason.”

“We had a community,” Liam says quietly. “We were staying somewhere. But we’re… we’re heading to DC now.”

“DC?” Owen asks incredulously. “Liam, that’s - that’s almost on the other side of the fucking country, buddy.”

“I know.”

“You’re in fucking _Idaho!_ ”

“We know,” Brett says. “It’s important. It’s not like a fun roadtrip or anything.”

“Not a fun roadtrip?” Vinnie asks. “I’ve yet to meet a roadtrip that’s fun anyway.”

“Roadtrips are awesome,” Brett says, feeling confused.

“Vinnie gets carsick,” Liam says. And right - Brett’s just remembered that Liam knew Vinnie and Owen before all this. They must have done a lot of travelling. Especially Liam, who Brett knows hailed from California just before the outbreak, who ended up somewhere in the general area of Colorado when Brett found him, who - by the sounds of it - travelled a fair way to get there, from another state, after Garrett’s death.

“We should sleep,” Vinnie says with a yawn. “Are you guys staying?”

“Don’t see why not,” Brett agrees. He feels okay to make their decisions for them - Liam’s deferred to him for everything anyway, and he’s clearly at ease here. Besides, they brought their car a little closer anyway, and it’s a matter of taking the ten-minute round trip to get their things.

“Cool,” Owen says cheerfully. “Well, I’m beat. Shotgun not for first watch.”

Brett smiles a little. “I’ll take first watch,” he says.

“Really?” Vinnie asks. “Aren’t you tired?”

“I prefer to sleep uninterrupted. It’s a selfish thing.”

“Oh,” Vinnie chuckles. “Right. Well uh, here. We’ll move out stuff.”

“Thanks, dude.”

~*~

Brett wakes up the next morning facing Liam.

Liam’s already awake; his eyes are open, and he’s watching Brett with an impossibly soft, open gaze. They aren’t sleeping curled up together like they usually do; Vinnie and Owen don’t know about them, and Brett wasn’t sure, last night, that Liam would want to be outed like that.

Liam smiles softly; his hand inches towards Brett’s, skimming his fingertips lightly. “Morning,” he whispers.

Brett smiles back drowsily. “Morning.”

Fudge gives a great, grunting snore, and they both laugh quietly. Liam sits up and begins to get breakfast going; it’s normal, until Brett rolls over and sees Vinnie and Owen on the other side of the fire.

Right. They’re in company. He tries not to be disappointed. He’s kind of used to spending most of their spare time having sex, though. Or reading. There’s no in between.

Liam must see his dilemma; he smiles widely. “Later,” he mouths.

Brett stretches, satisfied with that promise, and gets up. Soon enough, the smell of food wakes Owen and Vinnie too, and they gather around the fire to eat.

“So where were you, Brett?” Vinnie asks.

Brett looks up. “Huh?”

“When it hit,” Vinnie clarifies. “Where were you? We know Liam’s story. You know ours. How about you? If you don’t mind talking about it that is.”

Brett shakes his head. “I don’t. You’ve never heard the full story either, have you?” He directs that at Liam; Liam shakes his head, looking curious.

“I was camping with some friends,” Brett says. “We left right before it got bad - people were sick, and there were a few reports of biting, but nothing serious, you know? So we went camping anyway. Almost two weeks we were gone - totally out of cell phone and radio contact, you know, right up in the woods with whatever we could fit in the cars.”

Vinnie nods. “Sounds safe.”

“It was. We came back, learned what’d happened - we all split up to try and find our families. I went with a friend of mine to help him find his, because I lived out of state. Anyway, I tried calling my mom and sister.”

“Any answer?”

Brett sighs and shakes his head. “No answer. By the time I got back to a phone, the lines were down. They never went back up again.”

“Fuck,” Owen murmurs. “You’re like Li-Li, huh? Dunno what happened to your family?”

“Don’t call me that,” Liam says immediately.

“Sorry.” Owen’s grinning, though.

“Nope,” Brett says. “I hope they’re okay. I dunno, I’m not confident. Anyway, we figured that camping was working for us, and most of us had lost our entire families in the outbreak. We went back to where we were with more supplies.”

“So what happened?” Liam asks.

“It wasn’t sustainable to live there. Getting into town was too much effort, we didn’t know how to hunt, there wasn’t enough edible plant life around. A friend of mine got drunk and wandered into the lake and drowned. We couldn’t stay there. So we headed into town again - we lived on a pretty typical college campus, and we found a few more people. Got together with them. And for a while, things were okay - we holed up in an abandoned school. There were loads of us. Almost one fifty at one point.”

“Jesus,” Owen says. “We haven’t heard of anyone who did that well at the start.”

“Yeah, well, it didn’t last.” Brett shakes his head miserably; Liam scoots closer to him, until their thighs are touching. “Winter hit. That was when it started to get bad. People got sick-”

“That pneumonia,” Vinnie says. “Sorry, just - it’s bad shit.”

“Yeah. I’ve had it twice now.”

“What about you, buddy?” Owen asks Liam.

Liam shakes his head. “I haven’t had it.”

“Lucky. So - people got sick?”

“Yep. Got sick, lots died, turned - in the end we couldn’t salvage the place. We had to leave. After that we were losing people almost every day to something - getting devoured, being bitten, disease, whatever. Even pre-existing medical conditions. One guy - a diabetic - ran out of insulin and we couldn’t find any.”

“Jesus,” Vinnie murmurs.

“Yeah. Anyway, we kept trying to get out of where we were, but there were herds of walkers on either side of us and we kept getting turned back, so we ran out of stuff to loot. When we did eventually get out of there, a firefight broke out between us and another group. We were all meant to meet at Oakridge. My friend Tom told me going through Ashburton - following the tram line through the city - was the fastest way to get there.”

“You have directions?” Vinnie asks. “So why not go?”

“There were a few reasons. First, my friend didn’t tell me whether to follow the tram tracks left or right. Second, I got there only to be informed by Liam that the military had collapsed the tunnels out of the city, and that the few that were still open were guarded by an unfriendly group.” Brett rubs his face. “I travelled alone for almost two months before I got there, ran out of supplies completely, and was cornered by zombies when Liam found me.”

“You found him?” Owen asks. “You don’t trust strangers.”

Liam shrugs. “He wasn’t dangerous. It wasn’t meant to be permanent. He stayed one night, I gave him some food and water, and then the next day I took him out to one of the open tunnels. We did actually split up.”

“You didn’t take him with you?” Owen demands of Brett, and for the first time, Brett sees a flicker of some emotion that’s definitely unfriendly to him - not him as a potential threat, like it was when Owen pinned him, but him as a person. As someone who made a choice Owen clearly doesn’t agree with.

“He offered,” Liam says quickly. “I refused. We split up but I had this really bad feeling-”

“Oh yeah, you and your sixth sense,” Vinnie ponders aloud.

“Yeah. I went back into the tunnel, just to make sure he got out. There was a herd in there. We spent the night holed up somewhere else. The next day we headed back, and I tried to find him another way.”

“Which wasn’t possible,” Brett says. “Not in that time frame. It would’ve taken me a week to get to the next tunnel and Liam wasn’t sure it was clear. He said I could wait out the winter with him. It started snowing less than a week later.”

“What happened then?” Owen asks.

Liam shakes his head. “What didn’t? I fell through ice and Brett had to drag me out. Brett got pneumonia and almost died. He got kidnapped by a Keeper and then I got stabbed trying to save his damn life. Spent almost a whole month laid up.”

“Stabbed?” Owen asks, visibly horrified. Brett notes that Liam makes no mention whatsoever of his near-rape experience and wonders why he would bother hiding it. He knows there’s no way it just didn’t occur to him.

Liam lifts his shirt, showing off the scar. “Yeah.”

“And you lived?”

“Brett’s good with medicine and stuff,” Liam says, and he looks almost proud. “I would’ve died if it weren’t for him. He carried me back and stitched me up and went and found me antibiotics when the wound got infected.”

Vinnie and Owen look at Brett gratefully. Brett feels shitty whenever people react in wonderment; him getting kidnapped was the whole reason Liam was stabbed in the first place.

“Wait,” Vinnie says suddenly. “You mentioned Keepers? Weren’t you in Ashburton?”

“Yeah,” Liam says confusedly.

“But-” Vinnie looks to Owen, who shrugs, looking as bemused as Liam does - “we were holed up in a place just outside Bakersfield and we heard of Keepers there, too. Bad news, right?”

“Paedophilic slave traders with a taste for human flesh?” Liam asks.

“That’s them. They were in Ashburton as well? That’s fucking miles from Bakersfield.”

“They must have a network,” Brett says. “They are traders, after all.”

Liam nibbles his lip thoughtfully, then takes out a map and his glasses. Vinnie and Owen look surprised to see him wearing them.

“It would make sense though,” Liam murmurs, spreading the map open across Brett’s lap. “Because this…” He traces his finger long the red line through Ashburton, “is where the Keepers had their territory in Ashburton. They had control of seven outbound tunnels. This is the west side of the city, and…” He tilts his head. “Bakersfield is pretty much in that direction.”

“Since when did you need glasses?” Owen asks.

“That must be why they didn’t bother with the other tunnels,” Liam says thoughtfully. “They were too far away to be useful.”

“If they weren’t using the other tunnels, they probably didn’t have a point of contact out that way,” Vinnie says. “Otherwise they would have. From what we saw their network was pretty extensive. If there was any way those tunnels could’ve been useful… they would’ve taken them.”

“We should be careful,” Brett interjects. “If they’re that widespread. Have you guys had a lot of contact with them?”

He doesn’t miss the way Owen’s eyes widen. “Uh,” he says. “Only a little. Enough to know they’re bad news.”

“Right,” Brett says slowly. Something is amiss, but he can’t put his finger on it - and with Liam happily trusting Owen and Vinnie for now, well… he’ll give them the benefit of the doubt.

~*~

They all get along just fine until just after lunch.

After eating, Liam sneaks off with some excuse about checking the area for biters; Brett gives it a few minutes, so it doesn’t look suspicious, then says he needs to piss and follows.

Liam’s waiting for him around the far side of the next building over, a dilapidated car restoration shop. He looks pleased to see Brett.

“You got it.”

“I was hoping I got it,” Brett chuckles. “Hi.”

Liam steps closer to him, leans up, and kisses him - sighing when their mouths make contact and letting Brett back him up against the wall.

“I missed you,” he murmurs timidly.

“Yeah?” Brett feels his smile widening. “I missed you too.” He puts one hand on the side of Liam’s head, bending his neck down - he knows it hurts Liam’s neck to have it constantly stretching towards him - and using his other hand to hold Liam’s waist gently.

“I love you,” Brett murmurs. “I’m glad I’m here with you.”

Liam smiles against his mouth. “I love you too.”

Brett’s so engrossed in kissing Liam stupid and desperate that he doesn’t hear footsteps - he does, however, feel it when two huge hands grab him and yank him off Liam bodily.

“Wha-”

“What the fuck are you doing?” Owen bellows at him. “He’s a fucking kid!”

It takes Brett a moment to process what’s happening - they must’ve been gone a while, long enough for Owen and Vinnie to get worried about them - Liam, he reminds himself. They’re not worried about him, just Liam.

It clicks for him that Owen thinks he’s molesting Liam and that he’s got about two seconds, if that, to explain himself. “Owen,” he says, trying to stay calm and work out what to say. “Owen, I-”

“He too scared to leave you or something?” Owen demands. “This how you stuck around him? He didn’t know how to-”

“Owen!” Liam yells.

Owen stops; Liam’s come forward from the wall, and his lip is bleeding where Brett probably accidentally bit it in shock.

“Liam, you could’ve told us,” Owen says, his voice breaking. “You didn’t have to - we could’ve taken care of-”

“He’s not fucking molesting me,” Liam snaps. “I’m not doing anything I don’t want to do.”

“I just _saw_ him!” Owen yells incredulously. “Christ, why are you making excuses for-”

“I’m gay!” Liam shouts back.

There’s a long silence. Liam wipes his lip, then strides past Owen and leans down. Brett accepts the hand up gratefully, stands close to Liam as Liam turns back around.

“You’re…?”

“I’m gay,” Liam reiterates angrily. “Brett’s my fucking boyfriend, if you hadn’t already worked that out.”

Owen blinks, opens his mouth, then closes it. “Garrett-”

“Was also my boyfriend, can you stop bringing him up?”

There’s another long silence. Brett turns Liam towards him, quietly, and uses the sleeve of his shirt to wipe the blood from Liam’s lip tenderly. He’s wearing long sleeves, now - to hide the bite marks from Owen and Vinnie. He wasn’t sure he had to before - now he is.

“I’m sorry,” Owen says blankly. “I didn’t…” He looks at Brett. “This is the second time I’ve whaled on you,” he says regretfully.

Brett nods warily. Liam’s gone quiet; he doesn’t mind being gay, and Brett knows that, but he probably - no, definitely - didn’t want to come out to Owen like this.

“Is your lip okay?” Brett asks quietly.

“It’s fine.” His eyes drift over Brett. “Are you…?”

Brett nods.

“So, uh,” Owen says with a wince. “You… wanna come back for dinner?”

~*~

Oddly enough, it’s Brett who convinces Liam to go back to Owen and Vinnie.

Liam doesn’t want to - a combination of being embarrassed, angry, and scared, probably - but Brett brings him around, and soon enough, they’re back, with Vinnie looking very bemused.

“So,” Liam mutters, “there’s no point you being out of the loop. I’m gay, we’re together and Owen just tried to kill Brett _again_.”

Vinnie opens his mouth uncertainly; it stays that way for a while until he eventually says, “Well… we accept you no matter what, Liam.”

“Way to sound like a Hallmark card, buddy,” Owen mumbles.

They sit in strained silence. Liam sticks close to Brett, stabbing moodily at his food, scowling whenever Owen so much as moves. Brett wants to tell him to chill out; Owen genuinely thought Liam was being taken advantage of, and he had the right reaction to it. It’s not his fault that wasn’t actually the case.

Brett thinks, the next day, that maybe he should start a mental calendar - maybe he’ll call it Days Without Incident. Maybe he’ll call it something like… Days Without My Apocalypse Hermit Boyfriend Trying to Fight Everyone. Or, even better - Days Elapsed Since Owen Last Tried to Shank Me. They’re all in the running for it.

He continues to wear long sleeves and hide his bitten hand when he can; he figures they won’t react very well to seeing it, at any rate.

He’s right about that. He hasn’t even reached a decision on the title of his calendar when Owen and Vinnie find out about his bite; in fact, Liam’s barely simmered down since the last conflict he and Owen had.

It’s kind of stupid, really. Brett just forgets. The tingling in his hand barely served as a reminder as to his bite anymore; it’s just there. So his lapse in judgment - rolling his sleeves up in the heat of the day - can be understood, even if it can’t be excused.

“What’s that?” Vinnie asks.

Liam lifts his head; he’s been moping in the corner with Fudge’s head on his lap. He looks wary.

“What’s what?” Brett asks.

Vinnie’s staring at his hand; Owen follows his gaze. There’s a long moment of silence, where everyone is just trying to comprehend what’s going on; Liam moves before anyone else does.

“Holy shit,” Vinnie says faintly.

It takes him and Brett a moment to move; by the time they have, Owen’s already on his feet with a shotgun in his hands, and Liam’s put himself square between its barrel and Brett’s body.

“He’s fuckin’ bit!” Owen spits. “When the fuck were you gonna tell us?”

“It’s an old bite,” Liam snarls back. “He’s not infected.”

“Everyone who gets bitten gets infected!” Owen yells.

“Owen, maybe this is different,” Vinnie says quietly. “He doesn’t have any symptoms - he doesn’t even look sick-”

“That doesn’t mean he isn’t infected!” Owen shouts, raising the gun further. “We don’t even fucking know him!”

“He’s with Liam! He’s fine!”

“Fucking chill!” Liam bellows.

Owen and Vinnie stop arguing abruptly, looking shocked by Liam’s raised voice.

“You’ve tried to kill him three times now,” Liam snarls. “Once for going into the apartment and not knowing him, fine, I get that. Another for kissing me when I clearly wanted him to. And now this. You wanna try and kill him? Go ahead. But you’re gonna have to go through me first.”

There’s a long pause. Every time Owen moves, Liam adjusts to reflect the difference, making sure Brett’s behind him the whole time. His hand is totally steady; the gun doesn’t move an inch. Liam’s clearly not kidding.

“Owen,” Vinnie says softly.

“Christ, what?”

“Look, his hand isn’t bleeding. It’s scarred over. That happened a long time ago. Way too long ago for him to still have a chance at turning.”

“We can’t know that,” Owen growls. “This-”

“I was bitten about two and a half months ago,” Brett says. “By a recently-turned kid zombie. I was put into a coma about half an hour later - the doctors wanted to give my body a chance to fight back against the virus. And it did. I was comatose for six weeks, but when I woke up, the only remnants of the virus were the antibodies produced to fight it. I had blood tests almost every day to make sure the virus wasn’t active.”

“So who says it isn’t now?” Owen demands, taking a step to the side. Liam follows him, making sure Brett is totally behind him, the gun not even close to lowering.

“Owen,” Vinnie says softly. “It was active, he’d look like shit. We know that. He’d be turning right in front of us. He’s fine. I think he’s telling the truth.”

“You wanna go over and look?” Owen snaps.

“Neither of you are coming closer than what you already are,” Liam says coldly.

“Liam,” Vinnie says pleadingly. “Just… let me look? You know me. If I do anything, you’ll be able to shoot me dead before I can do any damage.”

There’s a long pause. Owen’s eyes flicker between Liam and Brett, his gaze like steel.

“No,” Liam says finally.

“Liam-”

“I can’t aim a gun at you and at Owen. No.”

“Liam,” Brett says softly, and Liam twitches. “Come on. You trust these guys.”

“I trusted them,” Liam says. “I shouldn’t have.”

Brett doesn’t miss the look of pain on their faces when Liam says that; they clearly care about him, and Brett’s getting the inkling that if this all smooths over, they’re going to regret everything that happened here. “Please,” he pleads.

There’s another long pause. Owen’s looking at Liam, and Brett assumes Liam’s looking right back. Liam might not win in a brute-force fight against Owen, but he’s definitely faster and if Owen moves, Brett has no doubt Liam will pull the trigger.

“Only Vinnie,” Liam says.

Brett almost sighs. He can tell Vinnie believes him and wants to diffuse the situation as much as Brett does. Too bad their travel buddies are both hot-headed, survival-driven weapons experts with hair-trigger tempers.

Vinnie steps forward slowly. Liam doesn’t take his eyes off Owen - he must think Owen’s the most immediate threat.

Vinnie stops just inside arms’ reach of Brett, and Brett puts his hand out - lets Vinnie manipulate his palm and fingers, inspect the skin, check how old the scar tissue is.

“Can you use this hand?”

“Yeah,” Brett says, watching as Liam’s head turns ever so slightly to pay attention to their conversation. “The patch of skin within the teeth marks is numb. I can’t feel it, but I can still move it. The nerves are damaged, not dead.”

Vinnie nods. “Two and a half months, huh?”

“Yeah. It took my body almost a month to start producing antibodies. Long recovery.”

“I bet. Milwaukee protocol?”

“Yeah.”

“Right. Muscle atrophy, weakness, delayed mental capacity. You seem fine now.”

“I recovered pretty fast, yeah. They didn’t have to put me under as deeply as you do for a rabies patient. I think that helped.”

Vinnie nods and steps back. “Owen, would you lower the damn gun?” he asks tiredly. “He’s fine. He’s not going to turn. No fever - he looks healthier than we do, for crying out loud.”

“You’re sure?” Owen asks warily.

“I’m sure.” Vinnie looks at Liam, opens his mouth, then closes it and turns to Brett. “This is why you’re heading to DC, isn’t it?” he asks. “To see if someone can make a vaccine. A cure or something.”

“Yeah,” Brett says. “The community couldn’t afford to send anyone else and Liam was in danger there anyway.”

Owen looks to Liam, genuine regret on his face. “I’m sorry,” he says.

Liam’s returning silence speaks louder than words. He doesn’t lower the gun. Vinnie returns to Owen’s side, looking sad and seeming to have realised that they’ve systematically poked holes in Liam’s trust, and that coming back from here will be almost impossible.

“Liam,” Owen says quietly.

“Try and kill him again,” Liam says, “I dare you. I won’t hesitate next time.”

~*~

Things are decidedly awkward from then on.

Liam’s supposed to take first watch, and he does - only when Brett awakens in the morning, Liam’s still up, looking like he hasn’t moved, and pointedly ignoring Owen, who’s trying to engage him in friendly conversation.

To anyone else, Brett supposes it would seem childish. Brett knows that it’s because Liam’s at the absolute end of his rope and is trying not to have an episode. He realises, upon waking, that Liam probably hasn’t slept all night.

He stands up and goes to Liam. “Hey,” he says softly.

“Morning.” Fuck, Liam looks exhausted - there are deep black bags under his eyes, which are red and look dry, even though he’s yawning. He’s pale, too. None of them can afford to get sick out here; Liam needs to rest.

Brett rubs the back of his neck, and Liam relaxes, almost unwillingly, under the touch. “You need to get some sleep,” Brett says softly, pretending Owen isn’t watching them.

“I’m not tired,” Liam says, and it sounds like a lie - even to Liam, judging by the defeated expression on his face.

“Come on,” Brett says quietly. “You really, really need to rest, okay? Everything’s fine. Get some sleep - my bed roll is still really warm.” When Liam stares into the fire, refusing to meet his eyes - God, he’s fucking stubborn - Brett says, “I’ll get some breakfast and sit with you.”

Finally, Liam meets his eyes reluctantly. There’s a moment’s hesitation, and then he says, “Alright.”

The moment Brett’s sitting down with his breakfast, Liam’s rolling up against him and closing his eyes. He’s asleep barely two minutes later.

There’s a long silence. Vinnie’s still asleep, and Brett’s happy to eat with Liam curled up on his left side and Fudge on his right. They’re both snoring.

“He wasn’t like this before,” Owen says quietly.

Brett chews his oatmeal. “He had to shoot Garrett to stop him reanimating,” Brett says quietly. “After that, he had to change. It would’ve killed him otherwise. If you don’t change in this world, you die.”

“I know.” Owen swallows, looking at Liam’s gently breathing form. “I just wish he didn’t have to, you know?”

Brett nods. “I guess that’s something we finally agree on,” he says softly. “Not that I ever knew him any different.”

“He was like this when you found him?”

Brett shakes his head. “He was worse. And he found me. If it weren’t for Liam, I… God, I could’ve died so many ways. Thirst, starvation, by zombie, by illness… the list goes on and on. He only ever got hurt from trying to help me but he kept coming back anyway.”

Owen shakes his head. “I just… can’t believe he’s still alive, man,” he murmurs. “We thought… when we went back to the sewers and him and Garrett weren’t there, we thought shit, well, maybe Garrett turned and took Li-Li down with him, y'know? We looked for 'em, too. Their corpses. Didn’t wanna leave 'em like that if they had turned, get it? They were just kids. Didn’t deserve to go like that.”

Brett looks down at Liam’s sleeping face. Garrett was sixteen when he died, Brett realises. _Sixteen_. Barely legal to drive, five years away from drinking - his voice probably hadn’t even finished breaking. He _was_ a kid.

“He’s not a kid anymore,” Brett says. “He turned eighteen a while ago.”

“Eighteen.” Owen whistles lowly. “Man. I’d forgotten it’d been so long. All just kind of melds together, you know? But we thought about him every day. We hoped he got out, but we didn’t really think he did. Guess he has a little more bite than we gave him credit for.”

“Plenty of bite,” Brett agrees, even as he thinks, quietly, that Liam’s bite is mostly to conceal how gentle and loving he’s capable of being.

Owen looks at him. “We didn’t know,” he says. “That he was gay. Or whatever.”

“He didn’t want anyone to.”

“Look, dude,” Owen says. “You’re nice enough. But if you’re just using him - to get laid, or for protection, or-”

“I love him,” Brett interrupts. “I’d die for him.”

Owen’s mouth opens, then closes. He doesn’t seem to know what to say to that, and the conversation dies.

It’s made Brett realise, however, that even though he and Owen both have Liam’s best interests at heart, that he’s going to have to really watch himself. It’s pretty clear, even though Owen says he’s nice enough guy, that Owen doesn’t actually particularly like him very much. Before, that wouldn’t have mattered… But now, in the After, people have been killed for a lot less.

~*~

Liam seems to have simmered down by the following day; by the next, he’s even acting a little friendlier, though it is stiff and forced. He’s trying to understand their viewpoint, Brett knows.

Four days after Brett’s bite is discovered, it’s decided that they’re going to loot the huge, double-storeyed Walmart complex. According to some maps of the area - and Liam’s sharp eyes - it should have a Walgreens inside it, on the second level, which could potentially mean a huge medicine haul.

Brett’s a little nervous; they’ve been out a little more than two weeks now, one of which has been spent here - and Vinnie and Owen have made no mention of any intent to move on. Brett feels vaguely concerned about that. They also haven’t mentioned any other group or people they might be travelling with - or why they’re here.

Still, looting the Walmart is the most they’ve done in a while, and so Brett and Liam volunteer their stash of weapons for the job - which is the whole reason they’re currently stood outside, with Brett holding the keys to their car.

“So you guys have a stash?” Vinnie asks curiously.

“Yeah. Pretty nice one.” Brett opens the hatch on the station wagon; Owen’s mouth drops open, his expression downright gleeful. Vinnie looks utterly terrified.

“What the fuck is all this?” Vinnie demands, looking in the back of their car.

“Supplies,” Liam says.

“Are those yours?” Vinnie demands of Brett, motioning to the numerous machetes, guns, knives, boxes of ammunition, and at least seven different, very deadly garden tools.

“No,” Brett says. “They’re Liam’s.”

Vinnie looks at Liam, seeming alarmed. “You are a _very_ dangerous teenager,” he says.

“It’s great,” Owen sniggers, swinging a huge arm around Liam’s neck and giving him a shake. “Look at this little badass, Vinnie. Who would’ve thought?”

“So-” Vinnie looks between Brett and Liam. “So Liam does the killing, and you do the rest of it?”

“Liam’s a pretty efficient zombie killer,” Brett says. “Or… re-killer. Seriously. Killed one with a ball point pen once.”

“Atta boy!” Owen exclaims proudly. “Knew you had some fight in ya, buddy.”

Liam smiles a little, almost warily. “Guess so.”

“Let’s make this sweeter,” Owen says. “Competition. First person to rack up ten kills wins.”

Brett frowns. Vinnie doesn’t look enthusiastic either. “Not such a good idea to seek them out purposefully,” he murmurs.

“Yeah, I - I only kill them if I have to, Owen,” Liam says hesitantly.

“Yeah, yeah, no!” Owen replies, eyes wide. “We don’t go _lookin’_ for them or anything. Just if we happen to see 'em. Remember, Vin? Like we did with the others.”

“Kill of the week,” Vinnie murmurs, smiling reluctantly.

Brett’s not smiling. Maybe it’s a good thing Owen tried to kill him; it’s raised tensions between everyone, sure, but it’s also diminished the amount of trust Liam seems to be putting in Owen’s abilities. It might come back to bite them later, but for now, it’s good that Liam seems wary of him and his behaviour.

“So what are we looking for here?” Liam asks.

“Non-perishables, medicine, bottled water,” Owen says cheerfully. “Vin, you wanna team up with me?”

Vinnie nods. Liam and Brett take the upstairs section of the Walmart; as they’re climbing up the escalator, everything’s quiet. Liam takes point with his crossbow, checking the area at the top before motioning for Brett; the coast is clear.

“So,” Liam says softly. “Medicine. Anything else that might be useful.”

Brett takes Liam’s elbow to stop him from walking further; Liam turns to him, his gaze curious, almost knowing. “Yeah?”

“Don’t play Owen’s games, Li,” Brett murmurs. “It could get you killed.”

Liam shakes his head. “I wasn’t gonna, don’t worry. He wasn’t this relaxed about them before. Like I know it’s been three years since the outbreak, and that everyone’s pretty desensitized to them, but I… I dunno. They’re still pretty dangerous.”

Brett nods. He knows that more than anyone. “Yeah. Do you have the list?”

Liam digs their list out of his pocket; Owen and Vinnie gave it to them, and Brett’s glad he teamed up with Liam - because Liam opens it and squints at the page helplessly before giving an irritated sigh and flicking it to Brett.

“Fuck, my eyesight’s shit,” he mutters.

“It’s good for long-distance, and that’s what’s important,” Brett says, reading the item list. “Alright. Let’s find this Walgreens.”

He leads the way through the shelves; he can hear Liam staying pretty close behind him, and Fudge, panting at the back. He’s suffering a little more with the heat; they can shed layers, but Fudge can’t take his fur off.

“You wanna give Fudge some water?” Brett asks, looking down at the list.

“Yeah.” Brett hears Liam’s pack drop and the opening of a bottle, then Fudge’s eagerly lapping tongue. “Good boy,” Liam coos. “You were thirsty, huh?”

Brett shakes his head a little. Most of the stuff on the list is standard - Tylenol, antibiotics, shit like that. But then, at the bottom - Lexapro. Not exactly standard medication.

“What’s up?” Liam asks.

“Nothing,” Brett murmurs.

They keep walking; Liam stays by his side now. After a few moments, during which Liam checks the left and Brett checks the right, they finally reach the pharmacy counter, and Liam murmurs, “Do you… think they’re lying to us?”

Brett hesitates. “How?”

“I dunno. About anything.”

“I think they know more about the Keepers than they’re letting on. Especially Owen. What’s the deal with them, anyway?”

“Oh,” Liam murmurs. “They both used to be real hardcore at the start, you know? We used to call them the Bash Brothers, Garrett and I that is. Obviously Owen’s still kinda like that but he’s like - taken it right up to eleven, y'know?”

_He’s tired_ , Brett realises, listening to Liam chatter. _He only ever talks like this when he’s tired._

“Anyway, uh, Vinnie - well, Vinnie had this girl. I don’t think she was his girlfriend or anything, but he loved her to death, right? Anyway, she went on a run and she just… never came back. We found blood where she was meant to be, but not lots of it. He lost it after that. Spent days out looking for her, memorised the whole city, you know? He never found her. He stopped eating, stopped sleeping… eventually he stopped doing anything.”

“Wow,” Brett murmurs. “That’s really sad.”

“Yeah. So now I guess - now I guess Owen does most stuff, and Vinnie’s along for the ride or whatever.”

“Do they stay in one place for a long time?” Brett asks.

Liam vaults the counter. “Not usually,” he says. “We moved from place to place a lot. But they weren’t the leaders of our group, either, and we were kind of forced to by the herds. So I’m not sure if that was them or not. Why?”

“We’ve been here a long time,” Brett says. “Them even longer. This is the first even remotely productive thing we’ve done the entire time.”

Liam stops and looks at him, seeming a little alarmed. “I hadn’t thought of that,” he murmurs. “Why…?”

“I dunno. Let’s just be careful, okay?”

“Okay.”

They scavenge for a bit. Brett looks for the Lexapro while Liam looks for over the counter medications; Fudge alternates between following them, first going with Liam, then finding Brett again.

“Fudge hates having us in different spots,” Brett comments when he rejoins Liam.

“Right? Poor little guy.”

There’s nothing little about Fudge; he weighs ninety pounds and Liam doesn’t have to bend to touch his head. Still, he gives Brett sad eyes when he hears his name mentioned, like he's confirming what Brett said.

They’re heading down the escalator when Liam stops. Brett follows suit, Liam looks put out, kind of nervous, as he looks around. There are goosebumps rippling up his arms and neck.

“Liam?” Brett asks quietly.

“Something’s not right,” Liam replies uneasily. “I don’t…”

Brett believes him. Liam’s never been wrong before. “Let’s find Owen and Vinnie,” he encourages softly. “We have to keep moving.”

But Liam’s really planted his feet, and when Brett goes to move past him, Liam grabs his wrist. “No,” he says. “Don’t.”

“Liam, if we’re really in trouble, the escalator is the worst place we can be,” Brett pleads. “Come on. We’ll get off it and find some cover until you feel better.”

Liam pauses again, but Brett tugs, and eventually, he starts to move - haltingly, and slowly, but he is going. Fudge stays near his side and halts when Liam does - a clear sign that Liam’s on the cusp of dissociation, or a panic attack. Fudge is only ever this attentive when Liam’s about to have a meltdown.

_Not here_ , Brett prays as he hustles Liam off the escalator. _Not now. Once we’re back, sure, but-_

“Duck!”

Brett doesn’t react, but Liam does - he’s grabbing the back of Brett’s neck and forcing him to the ground as an explosion of gunfire sounds, and bullets whizz over their heads.

_He was right_ , Brett realises.

“Don’t just fuckin’ sit there!” Owen yells. “Run!”

Liam drags Brett to his feet, and then they’re taking off - heading towards Owen and Vinnie, who are hiding just inside the children’s section, where they all stick out like sore thumbs.

They’re almost there when Brett - who’s slightly behind Liam - feels a hand grab his shirt and yank him down into the ground. There’s someone above him - he doesn’t get time to even look properly, his head spinning, before he hears Liam shout for Fudge distantly.

Fudge clears Brett’s body in an impressive leap, and his jaws close around Brett’s attacker’s arm - the one holding the gun. Brett’s already scrambling backwards when Fudge rolls his entire body left.

There’s a distinct cracking noise, and the man on the ground shrieks with pain; Brett grabs his gun before he can go for it, then Fudge’s collar with the other hand. Liam’s already cowering behind a rack of children’s books, and that’s where he makes a beeline too - skidding in safely just as there’s another round of gunfire.

“Are you hurt?” Liam demands, reaching for him.

“No, I’m fine. Are-”

“I’m fine too.”

“Okay, okay, you’re both fine!” Owen snaps. “We need to get outta here-”

“There’s an exit into the alleyway at the back of the store,” Liam pants, and Brett feels this weirdly out-of-place surge of pride; of course Liam knows a way out. Liam always memorises every entrance and exit into a place. He’s never unprepared.

“Okay, well, let’s go,” Owen says. “Vinnie. Vin, c'mon, dude.”

“I’ll stay with Vinnie,” Brett says. “I’ll keep him moving.” The guy’s practically catatonic with fear next to him. “You guys take point.”

“Right.”

With that, they’re up and moving - Liam’s slung his crossbow over his back in favour of a shotgun and handgun, and Brett’s got the gun he pilfered from Fudge’s victim. Owen’s packing probably four different weapons.

They move fast. There are still bullets going off, too close for comfort - approaching, even. Fudge lopes by Brett’s side, panting, staying exactly where Liam told him to.

They’re almost at the door. Of course, they would never get out that easy; Liam’s running ahead, straight for it, and Brett sees the barrel of a gun appear from behind the bookshelf.

“Liam!” he bellows. “ _Wait!_ ”

It’s not his shout that spares Liam a bullet in his chest or head; Owen yanks him back by the scruff of his neck, so hard Liam hits the ground on his ass. The gun goes off, someone cries out, and then there’s the sickening sound of a machete splitting a very human skull.

“Owen?” Vinnie croaks.

Brett’s main priority is Liam; he’s surging forward and pulling him to his feet, patting him down, checking he’s okay. He is. Nothing hit him; the cry wasn’t Liam’s.

“Fuck,” Owen’s voice moans.

Brett turns. There’s blood coursing down Owen’s thigh - the gun fired straight into it at close range, and it’s bleeding profusely.

Brett drops everything, even his weapons, yanks his pack open. “Liam,” he says. “Liam, I need your belt.”

“We can’t stop,” Vinnie says, uncertainly, like it’s a question.

“He’ll bleed to death if we don’t,” Brett snaps, fishing for bandages as he hears Liam’s belt open, then drag through the loopholes of his jeans. “Thanks. Can you hold these? That’s it.”

Liam looks vaguely petrified, a little sick, but he presses the bandages down on Owen’s leg as Brett uses his belt for a tourniquet.

“Guys,” Owen says weakly. “Don’t-”

“Shut up,” Brett snaps. “Liam, keep the pressure up, okay? Don’t stop.” With that, he’s beginning to wind bindings around the bandages tightly; it’ll have to do for now. “Alright. Liam, hey. You’re on point, okay? We’ve got Owen.”

Liam nods, picking up all his weapons. “Be careful,” Owen breathes to him.

“I will,” Liam pants. “This way.”

Liam is more careful this time; he’s jogging, but not running full tilt, constantly turning back to make sure they’re behind him. It’s not long before they’re slamming the door to the alleyway open.

“Oh, _shit_ ,” Liam breathes, stopping so quickly Brett runs into him.

“What? What’s-”

He turns. There’s a herd, right there, barely even a hundred feet from them - and when Brett and the others exit, they all turn.

An enormous din starts up; the zombies start shambling. Fudge is braying furiously at Liam’s feet, saliva flying from his jaws.

“Run!” Liam bellows, shoving them ahead. “Go, move-”

“We don’t-”

“Turn left at the end!”

Brett can hear gunfire behind them, knows that Liam’s taking down the ones that are an immediate threat. There are probably hundreds - and that, plus the presence of people shooting at them, means only one thing in Brett’s mind.

Keepers. They were already here; this is why Vinnie and Owen have been lying low. There are Keepers around, and by the looks of it, they’re out for blood - Brett's never seen them attack like this, though, or heard of it. Whatever beef they have with Owen and Vinnie, it's personal.

“They must be transporting the biters somehow,” Brett pants. “There weren’t this many before-”

“Who gives a fuck?” Owen moans. “Just keep moving!”

Brett might’ve thought about what a fight between him and Owen might mean, but he didn’t even take into consideration that the size that makes Owen a threat also makes him a liability when he’s injured - he’s immensely difficult to move, he’s heavy, there’s blood seeping from the bandages-

“Right!” Liam calls. Brett turns to look over his shoulder; Liam’s behind them still, and Fudge is between them all, whining and turning in circles with fear.

They turn right. The collective roar of the zombies is so loud it hurts Brett’s head; the stench is awful, so bad he could probably pass out from it if he didn’t have any other responsibilities, like living and keeping others alive.

“There,” Vinnie pants. “There it is. Go ahead, open the door-”

Brett runs ahead of them all, yanks the warehouse door open with every ounce of strength he has in his screaming, tired muscles. Five seconds later, Vinnie and Owen hop through; Brett turns to see Liam, almost where they left him, still picking off zombies with the shotgun.

“Get his ass in here now,” Owen groans.

Brett’s opening his mouth to shout, but Liam’s already running to catch up; he stops just short of the door. He seems to realise the same thing Brett does, at the same time - there are too many. If they decide they want in the warehouse, they're going to get in - pile up against the doors until they break down.

“Liam!” Brett yells.

Liam turns to him, then to the herd, and hesitates for only a moment before throwing Brett the shotgun; Brett catches it deftly with both hands. Liam stares at him for a moment, his eyes wide - Brett sees him make his decision, steps forward, opens his mouth to try and stop him, but-

“I’m right behind you,” Liam says, and then he’s slamming the warehouse door closed and bolting it from the outside. Brett lunges forward, but it’s too late - he hears the scrape of a bar being shoved through the handles.

“Liam!” Brett shouts. “Don’t-”

He hears a gunshot, and then barking. Liam’s footsteps fade into the distance, along with Fudge’s furious braying. Brett stands at the warehouse door, breathless, paralysed with fear, listening to the roaring din of thousands of zombies following Liam away.

Brett lurches to the door, about to yank at it, kick it - hell, do something - when a hand grabs the back of his shirt. When he whirls around, it’s Vinnie.

“No,” he whispers. “Liam bought us time, Brett. We have to be quiet or it’ll be a waste.”

Brett wants to deck him, but at the same time, he knows Vinnie is right. And he knows that Liam locked them all in here to protect them, that he’ll likely circle back around - if he’s still alive - and that Liam really believes Brett can save Owen’s life.

“He locked us in,” Vinnie pants as they rush back to Owen.

“There must be another way out,” Brett mutters - his throat is tight with panic. “He wouldn’t have locked that door behind us unless there was another escape route, better than this one. He’s not stupid.”

“He’s out there with - a million biters,” Owen rasps. “Instead of-”

“He could be dead because of you,” Brett snaps at Owen. Because he knows now - Owen knew the Keepers were here. He knew they were a problem. And he didn't disclose it, for whatever fucked up reason. He's not convinced Vinnie was in on the lying, but-

Owen stares at him, panting harshly with the blood flowing from his leg. “Brett, I-”

“They followed you here.” Brett’s fucking livid. “Didn’t they? The Keepers that is? They followed you here and somehow you didn’t think that was important information for us to know. You know what they nearly did to Liam last time they got hold of him?”

“Brett,” Vinnie says quietly, “he-”

“They tried to fucking _rape_ him!” Brett shouts, unable to control his rage any longer. “Do you have any idea how close he came to that? To being sold into a fucking slave trade ring? That’s who he’s out there with now and you did it!”

“I’m sorry,” Owen moans. “I didn’t want him to get hurt.”

“Yeah, well, he’s probably hurt now,” Brett says, his throat feeling tight and swollen all of a sudden. “But he left me here with your dumb ass because he thinks I can help you and if that’s what he wants, I’m gonna fucking do it, so hold still, shut up, and let me save your god damn life.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I bet you all thought he'd make it back by the end of the chapter hahaha
> 
> I'm sorry


	27. Chapter Twenty Seven - Cornered

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... many... em dashes...
> 
> This chapter is from Liam's P.O.V! Trigger warnings: mentions of rape, but nothing graphic or explicit, blood, violence. 
> 
> hope you guys enjoy! :D

**Chapter Twenty Seven - Cornered**

**Liam's P.O.V**

Liam's got two choices when he slams the warehouse door and bars it shut - turn left at the end of the alleyway, or turn right.

He doesn't have a lot of time to think about it. His instincts take him left, and he's relieved to see that the path ahead is clear; the zombies are still following him, and he's going to have to run a hell of a long way to outpace them.

_Don’t move up_ , he thinks frantically, ignoring the burning desire to make a run for a set of stairs. _Don’t go up, don’t get cornered, and don’t freeze._

It’s his set of rules. Don’t move up - moving up means coming down, and if the zombies move with you, you’re fucked. Don’t get cornered - well, the reasoning behind that is obvious. And don’t freeze. This is possibly the most important one - don’t freeze. Freezing, stopping, pausing, hesitating - they’re all enough to get him killed or bitten.

He swings right around the next corner, checking to make sure Fudge is on his heels. He is, panting harshly, his eyes bright with terror. But he’s keeping up, and he’s slowing when Liam’s slowing.

He’s only half a mile from the warehouse when he sees the flash of a gun barrel in a shop window; he flings himself behind a car just as shots ring out.

_The Keepers_ , he realises. _They brought the zombies here - they’re the reason we got split up in the first place. They’re still tracking me - or there’s so many of them, they don’t have to._

He scrambles to his feet, keeps moving; there are still guns firing, but he has a better chance of dodging the bullets - hell, of getting hit by one and surviving - than he does of surviving a herd of zombies coming down on top of him.

He turns to look over his shoulder. The herd has changed direction, and Liam can hear screaming; the shots have distracted the zombies enough that they’re no longer following him. They’ve converged instead upon the poor sap who was shooting at him.

_Now I can go up_ , he thinks, and he makes a beeline for a motel closer to the warehouse.

This idea, however, goes from bad to worse - upon putting his hand on the stair railings, Liam almost immediately slices it open on a warped piece of metal. It’s not the pain that alerts him to it - it’s the blood pouring out of his hand.

“Shit,” he moans. “Fuck. Okay.” Zombies can smell blood; his new priority is getting this wound bandaged up.

He keeps climbing the stairs, quickly, sweat pouring off his body. He’s surprised by how fast the blood is flowing from his hand, too; he’s really got to get something on it, and fast.

He’s just stepped into one of the rooms - intent on sitting down and cleaning up - when he hears footsteps in the hallway, banging noises, and spurts of gunfire.

_They’re spraying every apartment with bullets_ , he thinks faintly. _Fuck. I’m gonna die here._

Fudge gives an almost silent whine - he’s backing away from the door. His dog. They’re gonna kill his dog, too. And probably eat him.

Liam looks around frantically, then heads to the door and peers around it, just a little. There’s no one in the hall; only a few of the doors are open, and Liam can see an open exit at the end of the corridor.

“Fudge,” he whispers. “Go. _Go.”_

Fudge tucks his tail between his legs, pins his ears back; Liam strokes his head.

“Go,” he whispers. “Get out of here. Now.” Fudge has a better chance of making it on his own; Liam can work something out, he’s sure.

Fudge whines.

“Go find Brett,” Liam begs, his voice breaking. “Go find Brett, Fudge.”

Finally, Fudge gives an agreeable whine and takes off down the hallway at a sprint; he’s out the door so fast it’s like a mirage, disappearing when you get too close. At least now Liam can know his dog is safe.

“Hey!”

A bullet whizzes past the door; Liam whips back inside and looks around frantically.

The balcony, he realises.

The door isn’t locked; Liam yanks it open and heads out onto the balcony, which faces another row of the motel rooms. He can’t stay out here - anyone coming past from inside will be able to see him clear as day. But he can’t jump, either; it’s too far.

_Think, Liam. Think. There’s always another way._

He lurches over to the railing and looks down, then kneels and feels underneath it. He’s in luck - the underside of the balcony has a bar encircling it from underneath, probably fixed with lights for the patio of the room beneath this one.

_If Toby Maguire’s Spiderman can do it, so you can you,_ Liam thinks, and with that, he’s carefully vaulting the railing of the balcony, and then - slowly, bracing his feet on the concrete rim - lowering himself down.

He has to beg himself to let the bars of the balcony go - he can’t hang onto it without his hands being visible - one hand at a time, to hold onto the light fixture below. He’s dangling at least fifteen feet from the next balcony - which is made of nothing more than concrete and a metal grate, probably for water drainage.

_Easy. Just hang here until the coast is clear, then hoist yourself back up_ , he thinks faintly.

He hears footsteps; one of the Keepers is approaching the room. He hasn’t heard gunshots, and that means Fudge escaped unharmed. He’s relieved, even as he dangles helplessly, his shoulders and arms screaming, his injured hand slippery with blood.

There’s a long pause. Sweat drips into his eyes, which sting and smart from the salt. He feels the balcony shudder threateningly.

“Fuck,” a voice mutters. “Just missed ‘im.”

With that, the footsteps retreat backwards. Liam gives it a minute before trying to haul himself up.

He grunts; he can’t get the leverage, his arms are extended too far down to offer any support to his back muscles, and his hand - his hand is still bleeding, and his fingers are slipping quickly.

_I can’t get up_ , he realises with a surge of panic. _I can’t get back up onto the balcony. If I fall-_

If he falls, he’ll either die, end up badly hurt, or alert the Keepers to his position with the noise. He whimpers, trying to claw himself up again - and fails abysmally.

He’s going to fall. He recognises that. But he can at least postpone it - wait until they’re gone before he does, hope that he can get up and keep moving almost immediately. Otherwise, he’s screwed.

One minute turns into two; two turns into five. Liam wants to cry; he doesn’t want to let go, but he’s not going to have a choice in the end, and-

His bloody hand slips; his other can’t hold the entire weight of his body, and he plunges onto the balcony beneath him.

He feels the impact like he might feel the weight of a bus hitting him; the air’s knocked out of him, and pain explodes like fireworks down his left side. His head rings; he tries to move, but can’t.

“No,” he moans. “No…”

His vision blurs.

_I can’t pass out_ , he thinks, trying to sit up. _I can’t pass out. I can’t…_

~*~

Something wet is on his face.

For a moment, he drifts, lost in his own mind, his only tether to consciousness that wet sensation - dragging up his cheek, then disappearing before returning less than a second later.

He groans; he’s in pain, and his head hurts, and his body hurts, and he doesn’t know where he is or remember what happened.

There’s a low, anxious whine next to him, and the wet sensation grows more intense; it’s followed by tickling near his eyes and nose. He shifts a little, lets out another noise; he feels like he can barely move, even though so far, nothing seems broken.

Another whine. This one sounds concerned.

Liam opens his eyes.

He’s greeted by a huge black nose, right in the middle of his vision - and then, as he looks further, a brown and black snout and bright, intelligent brown eyes, so close to his face that his own cross as he tries to make out what he’s seeing.

A long, pink tongue darts out and licks his cheek. There’s a pause, and then a soft yelp.

“Fudge,” Liam whispers faintly.

Fudge’s ears tilt towards him, and he shuffles closer, licks Liam more enthusiastically. Liam reaches out, puts his hand on Fudge’s fur.

“I told you to find Brett,” he croaks.

Fudge huffs; now that Liam’s looking, he can see that Fudge is lying next to him, as close as he can, his body curled around Liam’s head. Liam’s partially on his back, his head tilted mostly towards the sky.

“Right,” he says exhaustedly.

The sun hasn’t moved much; he’s been unconscious, but not for long - less than an hour, maybe even only half an hour. His head is aching, though; he definitely hit it on the way down, and when he feels his head clumsily, there’s blood matted into his hair on the left side. It’s on his face, too.

_My hand_ , he thinks suddenly. _Gotta get it patched up._ Right now, it's sticky with congealing blood, still oozing a little; his fingers crackle when he moves them. He winces.

He sits up with a groan; Fudge scrambles to do the same, stays close to him. Liam was right; nothing’s broken, but he’s sure as hell injured somehow.

His pack is still on his back; now that he’s thinking about it, he realises it probably broke the majority of his fall. His crossbow is nearby, too - he’d tied it to his pack, and it’s hanging off the end.

“Small miracles, right, boy?” Liam asks weakly, and Fudge licks his face affectionately. “Thanks for coming back for me.”

He wraps a bandage around his hand, but he’s got to keep moving, and he knows that - the day is getting hotter, he’s hurt, and he has to get back to the others.

The others. Brett. Is Brett okay? The zombies followed him, but - what about the Keepers?

He begins to get up. He wobbles, but Fudge stays by his side, and Liam begins to feel a little hopeful - his dog came back, and he’s not as badly hurt as he assumed he would be from the fall. He can walk. He downs some Tylenol, too, for his head.

_Maybe there won’t be any other disasters today,_ he thinks hopefully, hefting his crossbow up with a wince. _Maybe-_

Fudge growls, and Liam whirls, his crossbow at eye height - there’s a girl standing right in front of him. Her hair and eyes are brown, and she looks startled to see him - afraid.

The expression fades after a moment; she takes him in. After a moment, she takes a step back from him and holds up her hands.

Liam glares at her for almost two whole minutes; she’s starting to look like she’s regretting her decision. But…

She doesn’t have a weapon. Otherwise she’d be aiming it at him. Reluctantly, Liam lowers his crossbow and begins to back away from her.

She looks surprised, hesitates before leaving. They don’t exchange a single word, and they part ways amicably, if not tensely. Liam turns tail to leave.

He’s got no idea where he is, and no map of the area; he wanders for half a mile in the wrong direction before _realising_ it’s the wrong direction. He’s hesitant to turn back, though; he hasn’t run into any more Keepers this way, but…

But he needs to get back to the warehouse. To meet up with the others. Help in whatever way he can, even though he’s pretty much useless unless he’s killing things.

In the end, Fudge makes up his mind for him; he’s followed Liam slowly, but when Liam stops, he grabs the bottom of Liam’s pack in his teeth and tugs a little, grunting. He knows they aren’t going in the right direction too.

Liam turns. “I know,” he murmurs. “Just doesn’t seem safe to go back, you know?”

Fudge pauses; he looks around, his teeth still clenched in Liam’s pack. Then he whines and tugs again.

“Okay, okay. We’ll do it your way.”

~*~

Fudge’s way turns out to be a bad way.

Sure, they get closer to the warehouse - but it’s not long before Liam realises, due to the recently-dropped corpses all around him, that he’s not alone here.

_Okay_ , he thinks nervously. _Okay, go back. Circle around. Find a map and work out an alternate route._

And he tries. God, he does try. He tracks back to try and find a newsagency, or a pharmacy - sometimes they have maps in them, if they’re big enough - but he doesn’t manage to get to one before he hears movement nearby.

He’s moving before Fudge barks in warning; a few bullets splatter the concrete where he was just standing, and he takes off. He can barely even feel the pain of his injuries with adrenaline coursing through him the way it is, with the knowledge that if he doesn’t move, he’s going to die.

_They’re herding me away_ , he realises, vaulting over a barricade and continuing his frantic sprint away from the voices following him. _They’re herding me away from the warehouse. Do they know the others are there? Or do they just want to stop me from figuring out where I am?_

He ducks into an alley, bends over, tries to catch his breath; he’s got no clue where he is. He’s freaking the fuck out. He wants so, so badly to be back with Brett he could cry from it.

“Give it up, Liam,” a voice calls smoothly.

The emotion Liam feels in that moment can only be described as terror; his muscles freeze, and his vision blurs, begins to go black. Whoever’s chasing him knows his name - and that means that they know him, and that whatever this is, it’s personal.

“You know, Liam, we won’t hurt you as badly if you just come with us now,” the voice says - and Liam sort of recognises it, but his memory of it is hazy. It’s not familiar enough to him to be someone he’s been around a lot.

_So who?_ He thinks blankly. _Who is it, then?_

“Come on, Liam… don’t make this hard for yourself.”

Liam straightens up, takes a deep breath, and starts to jog down the alleyway, trying to be quiet. There’s a long, tense, loaded pause; whoever it is, they’re listening for him, trying to work out where he is.

_I have to get out of the alley_ , he realises. _If I stay here, and they find me - I’m trapped. There’s nowhere to hide here._

He turns slowly, heads for the exit - he can just see it, but there’s a gate, and he’s going to have to climb it - there’s a padlock on it and he can’t waste time trying to force it, or shoot it and make noise. Fudge is narrow enough to slip through the bars, but Liam isn’t.

He climbs it carefully, slowly, wincing every time it rattles even a little bit under his weight, and drops to the ground on the other side. Fudge squeezes through the bars and joins him, licking his hand once he’s through.

_Okay_ , Liam thinks, looking around. _Now-_

He hears a click - the safety being taken off a gun - and bolts, only just leaving his previous spot as a single bullet whizzes through the air. It was calculated, not like the rest; whoever it is, they know what they’re doing.

“He’s moving again,” the voice calls. “Follow him.”

_How many are there?_ Liam wonders, starting to panic a little. _Because if there are too many - I’ll never be able to outrun them. They can just head me off, one after another, they can take breaks and rest and I can’t-_

Liam skids around the corner - right into a huge intersection filled with cars. There’s nothing else around; his options are limited.

He doesn’t hesitate. He finds a car closer to the edge of the intersection and slides underneath it; Fudge follows him under and curls up against his side, his ears back. “Shh,” Liam whispers to him.

The word is barely out of his mouth before he hears other people - maybe half a dozen, by the sound of it - enter the intersection. There’s a pause.

“He had to have come through here,” a voice says. It’s familiar, and not in a good way. Liam wracks his brains for the information.

“Nobody here, boss,” another voice says.

“There’s no other way he could have run,” the first voice says, and that’s when Liam realises - it sounds like Theo. And the second voice sounds like Josh.

_Is that Theo?_ Liam wonders uneasily, watching the figures circle around his car. _I’m so, so fucked if it’s Theo._

The circling lasts for what feels like hours. Even Fudge is breathing quietly, like he knows that panting will get them found out.

_The last time I saw Theo, I threw a fucking knife at him and nearly shish kebab’d him_ , Liam thinks frantically. He knows the least of his problems are potential sexual assault or a standard beating - if Theo catches him, he’s going to fucking torture him.

_And Fudge_ , Liam thinks. _He’ll kill Fudge. He’ll want to know where Brett and Owen and Vinnie are, and if he sticks enough knives in me or hurts me bad enough I’m probably gonna give them up, and they won’t know, and Owen’s hurt, and-_

The edges of his vision are beginning to go black, and his ears are buzzing. _Not now. Please not now. Fuck, I really can’t afford to have a fucking meltdown while there are actual psychopaths looking for me, I need to get back to the others, I need to-_

Fudge licks his cheek. Liam turns his head, slowly, looking into Fudge’s dark, intelligent eyes, takes in the way his ears are slanted back with fear. He licks Liam’s face again, silent when he’d usually be whining.

A long, loud whistle sounds, and Liam’s heartbeat jumps considerably as Fudge’s ears whip back up and begin to swivel around. Liam wraps his arm around the dog quickly, desperate to stop him from responding with a bark, or even so much as a whine.

Fudge settles. He must have realised the whistle wasn’t for him and didn’t come from Liam or Brett.

“There’s no one here,” Theo’s voice says.

“Sure, boss?”

“Positive. Mongrel dog would’ve answered to the whistle if there had been.” Liam sees feet move, so close to the car he almost flinches. “Do another sweep,” he says, and he must be talking to someone specifically, because only one person answers.

“Yes, sir.” It’s a female voice, a little high pitched with nerves. All the shoes move away, except for one pair.

Liam holds his breath. Counts to ten, then twenty, then thirty, listening to a single set of footsteps move slowly around the abandoned cars. He can’t pick any of the others out anymore.

A scraping noise, close by, and then the light under the car decreases - Liam whips his head around to see a girl staring at him, her mouth open with surprise, eyes wide. And Liam - Liam can’t believe how stupid he is, to have hidden _under a car_ , and-

He squints. She’s close enough that her face is sort of blurry because he’s not wearing his glasses, but - the same brown hair and brown eyes and she’s really, really thin. She looks like she probably would be anyway, but-

_I let her go_ , he thinks, bewildered, as he realises that she’s the girl he bumped into while leaving the motel after his fall. _I let her go. She’s with Theo. I’m toast._

She stares at him for a long moment - then, glancing sideways before looking back to him, presses a finger against her lips, then holds up both hands, opening and closing them.

Twenty minutes. Liam gets it. He’s not sure he trusts her, but he gets it. She wants him to stay here for twenty minutes.

“Hayden!” Theo’s voice shouts. “What’s taking so long?”

“There’s a lot of cars,” she says, standing up. “All clear. He didn’t come this way.”

_Huh?_

“Are you sure?” Theo’s voice demands suspiciously. “Josh said-”

“I think he went east, towards the boulevard,” Hayden says quickly, and Liam memorises it - go west, stay off the boulevard, move quickly. It’s back towards the zombies, but it’s also back towards the others - and their car, which, if Liam’s careful, he might be able to loot for Owen.

He clenches his hand, wincing. The rag he wrapped around it is soaked with blood. The zombies will be able to smell him from a mile away.

“Alright,” Theo’s voice says, sounding dangerously pleased. “Good job. You might just eat tonight. Looks like we’re heading to the boulevard.”

_Is that why she’s so skinny?_ Liam wonders. _Is Theo using food to make them do what he says?_ And then he realises - once they get to the boulevard, and Liam’s not there, Hayden’s in deep shit. She won’t be eating regardless. Liam almost feels bad, even though she’s with the Keepers. Nobody should have their food withheld from them.

He looks at his watch and counts. Twenty minutes come and go; he’s starting to feel weak and shaky. He’s been on the run all day, ever since he got split up from the others, and he hasn’t managed to eat or drink anything in that time - plus, he’s lost at least some blood from the cut across his palm, and the fall didn’t do him any favours either.

_Brett can stitch it up_ , he thinks, wincing at the stinging sensation. _Get back to Brett and he’ll fix it up for you._

After twenty five minutes, Liam takes a deep breath and slides towards one side of the car. There’s no one around that he can see, and he hasn’t heard footsteps in almost half an hour.

He crawls out clumsily and stands up, his crossbow raised in his good hand and his injured hand resting on the gun at his waist. There’s no signs of life - dead or undead.

“Fudge,” he says quietly.

Fudge wriggles out from under the car and joins him, now panting. He’s gotta be thirsty and hungry too - and hot. Liam’s still got all his supplies, thankfully - his next course of action is to find somewhere to hunker down and patch himself up.

“C'mon, boy,” he whispers, taking off at a light jog. Fudge follows him dutifully; Liam has no idea where he is, and he realises pretty quickly he’s gonna have to find a map.

He doesn’t jog for long - maybe only fifteen minutes before he settles back into a brisk walk, putting as much distance between himself and Theo’s gang as he can. He needs to finds a newsagents, or a pharmacy - preferably both, preferably combined into one.

He has to walk for almost another half hour before finally spotting one. By then, he’s panting almost as much as Fudge and exhausted - he needs to get indoors or end up with heat exhaustion. He can’t afford that to happen, so he’s relieved when a Rite Aid looms up in front of him.

“This way, Fudge,” he murmurs exhaustedly.

The doors have already been bashed in, and Liam has to waste ten more precious minutes making sure the place is clear before trying to find somewhere safe to hunker down and treat his wound. His head’s swimming - it could be exhaustion, or dehydration, or an oncoming episode, or, if he’s really fucking unlucky, he could already be suffering from heat exhaustion or an infection from the cut.

He finds the main pharmacy counter and drops to the floor behind it, feeling marginally safer to be out of immediate sight and with his back against something. He swallows thickly as he pulls his pack off, then unzips it. His hands are shaking; his entire left side is pulsing with pain, particularly his hip and leg. Liam tilts his head back, squeezes his eyes shut - the pain’s a step up from a standard ache, enough to hinder his movement, and he’s worried he’s injured it really badly.

Fudge whines piteously, licks his hand, and shuffles closer. “It’s okay,” Liam whispers - even though it’s not, not really; a leg injury is almost the worst kind you can have in the zombie apocalypse - using his good hand to rub Fudge’s ears. “We’re fine now.”

_Thanks to that girl. Hayden._ He pushes that thought out of his head and reaches into his pack, finding a litre bottle of water first.

He drinks slowly, knowing that if he really does have heat exhaustion, he’s in danger of puking it all back up. He doesn’t feel the urge, though, and when a quarter of the bottle is gone, he drags one of the prescription trays down from a shelf and pours some in for Fudge.

Fudge leans down and drinks thirstily; Liam smiles tiredly, rubs Fudge’s ears again, and caps the water before going back to his bag. The first aid kit is next. He’s got no idea what’s in it - Tamara packed the first aid kits and medical supplies for them - but he’s really hoping to find something useful.

He unclips the little case with his good hand and flips it open; Fudge puts a paw on his knee and whines, so Liam pours him some more water before continuing.

He’s in luck. There’s a few rolls of bandages, vinegar, salt, iodine, Tylenol, and, most importantly, some Neosporin.

“Shit,” Liam sighs, relieved. He unwraps the bandage around his hand, grimacing when he sees the injury, and feeling a little faint with the realisation that he’s going to have to confront his fear of blood and wounds.

Fudge gives a soft huffing noise, nosing at Liam’s hand curiously. “Yeah,” Liam says. “I’m okay. We can eat after this.”

He pours a little water over the wound just so he can see what he’s doing - what he’s working with. It seems to have stopped bleeding, but it does run from the heel of his hand to just below his pinky finger. Brett’s going to want to stitch it.

He grits his teeth for the next part - vinegar. Not only does vinegar make most environments totally inhospitable for bacteria (at least according to Tamara), it also seems to cover up the scent of living things, making it hard for zombies to sniff him out.

The vinegar stings like a bitch. There’s no one around, and Liam doesn’t bother holding back a whimper of pain as he cleans the wound out with it, then puts some Neosporin on it, and then finally wraps it in a clean bandage. It hurts like a fucking bitch, but at least he’s done everything he can to stop it getting infected.

He groans as he stands up. “Stay,” he tells Fudge tiredly, and then moves off to try and find a map.

There are a few tourist maps at the counter; he grabs them and, to his surprise, finds that there are bottles of water in the drink dispenser. He makes a note of that - he can come back and get some on the way out, maybe.

He doesn’t feel bad about pilfering about ten bags of jellybeans, either, remembering that they last a long time after their printed expiry date. With his map and jellybeans in hand, he begins scouring the aisles for more useful stuff.

“Yes,” he murmurs to himself, grinning, when he rounds the corner and finds an aisle of pet food. He’s quick to snatch up a few different things for Fudge, then heads back to the medications counter.

Fudge is waiting patiently, right where Liam told him to. “So,” Liam says, sitting down, “check it out. We hit the fuckin’ jackpot.” He puts everything down, then rips open the packaging for a rawhide bone. Fudge drools a little. “Yeah, okay. This is for you. But I’m not sharing my jellybeans, okay?”

He holds the rawhide bone out, and Fudge takes it from his grip carefully, then settles down with it between his paws. Liam smiles as he flips open his map and tears open a bag of jellybeans, grateful for the sugar kick they’re about to provide him.

He spends about five minutes just locating where exactly he is on the map - closer to the warehouse than he thought, upon further inspection. He’s got almost three miles to travel to get back, and another one if he can make it to their car for medical supplies. If he moves fast, though, and takes mostly main streets, he can do it before nightfall.

“What d'you reckon?” he murmurs to Fudge. “Do we risk the main streets and get there faster, or do we play it safe and go back alleys, maybe have to hunker down somewhere safe for the night?”

Fudge grunts at him. Liam rolls his eyes.

“You’re so helpful.” He chews his lip for a moment. “Well, what with my hand and Owen being hurt - Brett’s gonna need all the help he can get. We’ll risk the main streets, circle back to the car, bring it as close as we can. That way we’ll have medical supplies, right?”

There’s a loud, sickening crunch as Fudge rips the rawhide bone into two pieces. Liam winces.

“Right. Except I’m a shitty driver, so I don’t know how that’s gonna work.” He’s eaten almost the whole bag of jellybeans; before, he would have felt guilty, but now, he just feels immensely satisfied. “You know, Fudge, I can kinda understand why Tallahassee spent the entire zombie apocalypse searching high and low for a fucking Twinkie. I really missed jellybeans. And I didn’t even like them that much before.”

He has some meat. Protein’s important. Drinks some more water and pours some more out for Fudge, then picks the lock on the back of the vending machine and loots it. Looks around for any medicine that might be useful, but that seems to be mostly gone.

“Did you ever see that movie?” Liam asks. Fudge tilts his head, ears pricked up; Liam’s given him some kibble, but skipped on the wet food. It expires just like human food does; he doesn't want Fudge to get sick.

“Zombieland,” Liam clarifies. “Did you ever see it?” He starts packing his things up. “Man, that was a good movie. Come to think of it, I reckon loads of Columbus’ rules have kept me alive. Like - always double tap. Don’t just _think_ a zombie is dead. _Know_ it’s dead.”

Fudge blinks.

“Yeah, you were probably too young,” Liam muses. “Alright, let’s go.”

His pack is heavier with the extra stuff in it, but he’s feeling stronger for the water and food and rest, and he knows where he’s going now. Fudge trots along beside him faithfully, never breaking from his side - even though Liam’s slow, and he’s limping pretty badly. If anything, his dog stays closer than usual.

He looks down at the map. Almost three miles, then another one. He’s gonna be doing a lot of walking today; his shoulders and arms are aching from hanging on the balcony for so long, and from climbing all over stuff in his effort to evade Theo and his gang. He rolls them, cracks his neck, sighs.

“Gonna need a massage after this,” he mumbles to himself, scanning the area carefully. He’s on a main road, walking on the left-hand side, and there are cars everywhere. Cars generally mean less zombies - because their occupants fled on foot during the fall - but sometimes, it means random zombie corpses falling out of front seats, jaws gnashing and seatbelts digging into their rotting flesh.

He can’t see any, though. Plus, car pileups can actually slow the fuckers down. Zombies aren’t really like anything depicted in media; they’re not always slow, but they are, as a blanket rule, pretty stupid. They don’t have the sense to go around cars like movies and TV shows depicted before; they run straight into them. And walls, and fences, and whatever else happens to be in their way. A car pileup can be a pretty effective way to slow a herd down.

He keeps as brisk a pace as he can, jogs sometimes to speed things up, and eventually, he reaches his and Brett’s car. He only sees a few zombies on the way there, and doesn’t stop to dispatch them; fresh corpses means people, and if Theo circles back this way, he’ll know Liam was there.

He kneels by the front wheels of the car; the keys are right where Brett hid them. Liam’s grinning as he pops the trunk, tosses his pack in, and then lets Fudge into the back seat.

“Brett’s gonna be stoked to see us,” Liam says to Fudge happily. “Bet he thinks we’re both dead. And we’re coming back with jellybeans, which… I mean, I’m kinda young to get married, but I do expect him to at least semi-seriously propose to me.”

Fudge barks.

“Yeah, yeah, he’ll be glad to see you too, I promise.” Liam starts the car. “Sorry if it’s bumpy back there.”

It takes him a while to get the hang of the accelerator and brakes again, and the steering, and Fudge moves in the back like he’s sort of alarmed until Liam does. But Liam makes it back to the warehouse and climbs out of the car, grateful to be back home - not to a place or anything, but just to be back with Brett.

He pulls the bar across the door off and, after taking a deep breath, slides it open.

For a moment, he doesn’t understand what he’s seeing. His eyes scan for Brett, for Owen or Vinnie - for anything. They come up empty. Another pass reveals the same thing; they aren’t here.

Liam’s heart lurches. “Brett?” he calls, jogging into the cavernous room. “Owen? Vin?”

Nothing. Liam’s heart is really pounding now, frantically, not understanding what’s going on. How could they have left? _Why?_ There’s no signs of a struggle, and Owen was injured-

His head’s spinning. He sits down clumsily, his vision a narrow tunnel, black spots in the tiny field he does have, his breaths yanking on his ribcage like hooks joined to a wire. _Panic attack_ , he realises faintly. _I’m having a panic attack._

He feels Fudge beneath his hands, hears a distant whining.

_How am I going to find them again? Where did they go? Why did they leave?_

_Are they even alive?_

~*~

He must totally black out, because when he next opens his eyes, the sun is lower and he’s thirsty.

Fudge is sitting next to him, his head shoved under Liam’s arm, whimpering quietly. Liam straightens up a little bit, opening his mouth as it all comes back to him.

Walmart. Leaving Brett and the others here. Getting shot at by Keepers. Falling from the balcony. Getting chased by Theo - that girl, Hayden, letting him go. Letting him live.

It’s been a long day, to say the least.

Fudge moves his head when he senses Liam coming back to himself, licks his cheek. Liam smiles. “Hey, boy,” he whispers, kissing Fudge’s snout. “I’m sorry for scaring you.”

He’s scared himself too. He’s lost a few hours of time, but he’s tired, so he knows he wasn’t exactly unconscious. He dissociated, probably, and took a while to come back. He wishes Brett was here, but… it’s his job to look after them this time around.

He stands up. Just as he’s making to pick up his pack - he doesn’t even know where to start when it comes to finding Brett and the others, but he can’t waste daylight - Fudge lets out a low, sinister growl.

Liam tenses, reaching for his knife. He watches Fudge’s eyes move around the room, follows the swivel of his ears. They stay pointed at one of the rows of shipping containers.

_There_ , Liam thinks, slinking forward. _There’s someone there. Someone he doesn’t know._

He reaches the corner, begins to turn - and a hand comes out of nowhere, grabbing his wrist and twisting until he drops the knife; just as he looks up, a knee comes jerking towards his stomach.

Not fast enough, he thinks darkly as he grabs the offending leg and uses it to tip the person backwards. Before they can get up, and they’re lying winded on the concrete floor, Liam’s on top of them, pinning their wrists.

He blinks when he actually stops to look at the person. He’s not fighting an adult male; it’s the girl from before. Hayden. She’s glaring at him, wriggling furiously, but he’s got her pinned easily. He does ease up on the pressure he’s got on her wrists, though.

“Let me go,” she spits.

“You shouldn’t start fights you can’t win,” he snarls.

She squirms furiously beneath him, but she can’t get away from him; she’s skinny from malnutrition and Liam’s much stronger than her. “Where are my friends?” he asks coldly.

“What the hell are you talking about?” she snaps.

“My friends. Where are they? You lured me out of here, chased me away, and gave me a roundabout route to get back - what the fuck did you do to them? Where’s Theo?”

She blinks, looking suddenly confused. “I didn’t do anything to them,” she protests. “I swear. And Theo isn’t here. That’s why I am - I came here to warn you guys that he’s going to keep looking for you and that you have to keep moving. He was back at our camp the last time I saw him.”

“Oh yeah? How’d you get away?” He doesn’t get off her, even though she’s starting to look frightened, evidently realising he doesn’t believe her.

“He thinks I’m out hunting.”

Liam thinks. Theo keeps sending this girl - Hayden - to do the dirty work, which means she must be tough… which means pinning her down and roughing her up might be akin to pouring gasoline onto a fire. _She can probably fight me off somehow,_ Liam realises. _Waiting for an advantage, maybe?_

He’s been silent too long; she tilts her chin back, her large brown eyes on him, and says, “If you’re going to rape me, get it over with.”

He blinks. His stomach lurches; he didn’t want her to think that he was going to rape her. He just wanted to scare her a little bit, make her tell him where Brett and the others are.

“I’m not.” He swallows; she looks confused for a moment, but also not like she feels like lowering her guard. “I - I’m not like that.”

“You’re not proving your point by pinning me to the ground,” she snaps back at him. “You owe me. I let you go-”

“I let you go first,” he counters in a growl. Fuck, she’s infuriating. “Why did you?”

“If I tell you, will you let me up?”

“If you don’t tell me, I definitely won’t let you up.”

“Well, you’re not gonna do anything else to me, either,” she says coldly. “At least according to you.”

Liam grits his teeth. He’s never had his patience so badly tested by another human being, let alone so quickly. But if he wants information, he’s going to have to give a little somewhere; she’s clearly been bullied around before, worse than what he’s willing to do to her, because she’s not giving.

He lets go of her wrists, but stays astride her, just to see if that’s enough. She draws her arms back to her body, rubbing her wrists and wincing. He feels a twinge of guilt when he sees the marks his hands have left on her; he didn’t mean to hurt her.

“You weren’t shooting back,” Hayden says finally, reluctantly. She still sounds pissed off. “You had a gun, and we all know you’re a good shot. Theo told us. But you didn’t shoot back.”

“I wasn’t trying to hurt anyone,” Liam says. “I was just trying to lead the herd away from my friends.”

She nods.

“Why did you follow me?” Liam asks. “Why come back here?”

“I already told you that. To warn you.”

“But why?”

She hesitates. “You don’t seem like bad people,” she says. “Especially not you.”

Liam narrows his eyes. “How do you know?”

“You’ve never killed anyone,” she says confidently. “If you had, you wouldn’t have hesitated to shoot at us.”

“What’s Theo gonna do when he realises you’re stabbing him in the back?” Liam asks. “I bet he won’t be happy.”

“He won’t find out if I get my way,” she mumbles. “Besides, he can’t do anything worse than what he’s already done.”

Liam’s stomach turns; Hayden can’t be much older than him, maybe even the same age, and Liam knows what the Keepers do to their younger victims. He’s suddenly disgusted with himself for sitting on top of her - like he’s no better than them - and climbs off her quickly.

She sits up, watching him warily. “You’re letting me go?”

“Yeah,” he mutters. “You’re either telling me the truth or you’re not, but either way it doesn’t change the fact that I’m not a fucking monster and I’m not gonna tie you up or beat you half to death. Even if I should.”

She stays where she is; Liam stands up, wobbles dizzily. He’s only just beginning to realise that his fall from the balcony was worse than he thought; his ribs, hip, and leg on his left side are all throbbing pretty insistently, and his head is swimming.

“Are you hurt?” Hayden asks him quietly.

“Probably,” Liam mumbles back, going to sit on a few piles of boxes. Fudge returns to his side. “I fell off a balcony.”

Her eyes widen. “You fell off-”

“A balcony. Yeah. Hit the ground pretty hard.”

“You could have broken bones,” she says.

He shrugs. “Nothing feels broken.” He looks up; she’s still exactly where he pinned her. “Kind of figured you’d cut and run once I let you go,” he mutters.

She hesitates. “You’re hurt. If you’re hurt, I…”

“I can take care of myself,” Liam mumbles.

“You’re hurt because we chased you,” she says. “Do you - want me to take a look? Just… to check that nothing’s broken.”

He thinks about it for a moment. Does he want her to look? Not strictly, but the peace of mind would be good - if he knows nothing’s broken, he can keep moving safely, even if he’s in pain, and get back to Brett and the others by tomorrow.

“Okay,” he says, and straightens up. She looks surprised - she wasn’t expecting him to agree, evidently - but she gets up and comes over to him anyway.

“Can you lift your shirt?” she asks softly.

He pulls his shirt up with a wince; when he looks down, he can see that his side is going black and blue with bruising - it’s even in the pattern of the steel grate he landed on. Hayden hisses when she sees it.

“It’s all the way up your arm and ribs,” she says. “And your leg too by the looks of it.” She’s clearly shaken. “How far did you fall?”

“Fifteen feet,” Liam murmurs. “Maybe twenty. I hit my head - think I got knocked out for a bit, because Fudge came and found me.”

“You probably have a concussion,” she says.

“Wouldn’t be the first time, won’t be the last.” He looks her up and down; she’s shivering, even though it’s kind of warm out still. “I’m not sure I can trust you,” he says bluntly.

“But you are,” Hayden counters. “Not that I trust you either.” Her eyes are assessing him, the same way Brett’s might when he’s looking to see if Liam’s injured. “Your hand…”

He pulls it closer to his body. “I cut it,” he says, almost defensively. “It’s the whole fucking reason I fell off the balcony. My grip slipped.”

She motions to it. “Did you stitch it up?”

“No,” he mutters.

“You can’t just leave it open-”

“Well, I can’t stitch it myself either.”

There’s a long, tense pause. Hayden looks pissed off, and Liam knows he definitely is; they both appear to have fiery tempers and short fuses. Hopefully they don’t blow up at the same time.

“I can,” Hayden says.

“And why would you do that?”

“I’ve already risked my neck twice today, what’s once more?”

Liam doesn’t want to let her closer. But an open wound has a much higher chance of infection, which he really cannot afford right now, and he can’t stitch it himself. He’s irritated when he holds his hand out to her.

She takes it, unwinds his haphazard bandage, and winces when she sees the cut. “This must hurt.”

“Little bit.” Liam motions to his bag. “There’s a medkit in there.”

Hayden retrieves it, comes back, and settles down on the containers next to him. She’s quick and confident when she threads the needle, ties it off, and wipes his skin gently - she knows what she’s doing.

“Why are you helping me?” Liam asks.

Hayden pushes the needle through his skin, and he hisses in pain. Nothing will ever hurt as badly as Brett stitching him up just after being stabbed, but he’s never going to get used to needles.

Hayden does two more stitches before answering him. “You just… I don’t know. You went out of your way not to hurt anyone. You could’ve killed that guy who went after you in the motel. You didn’t. You hid instead.”

“How long have you been following me?” he asks quietly.

“Don’t flatter yourself. I wasn’t following you specifically. I was watching your whole group trying to get out of Walmart.” She shrugs. “I usually get assigned to a team to make sure they’re doing what they’re supposed to be doing. But we’re all just kids really. We don’t know what we’re doing. Hardly any of us have experience.”

“Probably why I didn’t get hit when you were all shooting,” Liam mumbles.

Hayden nods. “How come you didn’t stitch this shut yourself?” she asks.

Liam looks away, his jaw clenched. “I’m not good with needles,” he mutters.

She pauses for a moment. Then, “Neither is my sister. I’m used to patching people up.”

Liam winces as she pushes the needle through his skin, but truth be told, she really is gentle - and, despite it all, he’s grateful not to be alone. He’s still not entirely sure he can trust her, but he doesn’t see much of another option.

“One of the other guys is our medic,” Liam says stiffly.

“Yeah?”

He nods.

“Which one?”

“The other blonde one.”

Hayden nods and ties the stitches off, wraps his hand in a new bandage. “Done,” she says. “It shouldn’t hurt as badly anymore.”

Liam twitches his fingers, wincing a little. She’s right; it does still hurt, but nothing debilitating, and at least he doesn’t have to worry about having an open wound anymore. “Thanks,” he says.

She nods; she looks almost nervous. “Theo’s gonna realise I’ve been gone too long soon.”

“So don’t go back,” Liam says blankly. “Why are you even with him? You’re nothing like them. Unless this is all a big elaborate trick and you’re actually worse than them.”

“I don’t have anywhere else to go,” Hayden murmurs.

“What about your sister?”

“I don’t know where she is. Theo and the rest took me in… well, sort of. It’s not exactly the best situation but it’s working.”

He looks at her incredulously. “He withholds your food,” Liam says pointedly. “I don’t see how that’s working for you.”

She turns to him properly, her expression fiery. “Do you have any better suggestions?” she snaps. “Any utopic societies you’d like to disclose to me before judging the choices I made to stay alive?”

“Fuck, it’s like talking to a fucking thesaurus,” Liam mutters , reaching into his pack and taking out some dried rabbit meat. “Here. Just eat something and stop biting my head off.”

She looks at him. “Eat something?”

“Yeah. You’re hangry. I know the feeling. Just… fucking eat. Or something.”

"Hangry?" she asks blankly.

Liam rubs his face. "You know... hungry and angry?" 

Hayden stares at him for a moment, and then takes the package of meat from him slowly, like he’s about to whip it away and say “Sike!” like a twelve year old. He doesn’t; she opens it and starts to eat.

For a while, they’re quiet. Liam gets a fire started while she eats, then feeds Fudge, and then, finally, himself. After a while, he swallows and says, “So, you gonna go back to Theo?”

She shrugs. “I don’t want to.”

“Do you have one of those chip things?” Liam asks.

“The trackers? Yeah.” She sounds subdued. “We all do. But he can’t see where I am right now anyway. He doesn’t have the actual tech with him.”

Liam nods. “You should take it out,” he says.

“And how would I do that?”

He shrugs. “I could do it,” he mumbles.

She stares at him. “You couldn’t stitch your own hand up.”

“They don’t bleed much. I could probably do it.”

“I don’t trust you.”

“Good, we’re in the same fucked up boat.”

She must eventually decide it’s worth the risk, because she lets him cut it out - he’s seen Brett do it a few times, so he knows what he’s looking for; the slight bump under the skin, the scar from where it was implanted. He won’t lie and say that he doesn’t almost faint when she makes a brief, choked noise of pain and bleeds, but he does get it out of her.

“Good thing it doesn’t need stitches,” he mumbles as he puts a bandage over it. “You’d be fucked.”

She smiles a little, but it doesn’t reach her eyes. She hesitates for a second - and, in the next, she’s reaching over and sliding her hand up Liam’s thigh.

Liam jumps about a foot in the air as her hand reaches his dick, and quickly, at that; he grabs her wrist and pulls her away. “What the fuck are you doing?” he snaps.

She looks almost offended. “For the food,” she says. “And taking out the-”

“What?” Liam splutters. “No! No, I’m not doing that!”

“It’s all I’ve got on offer,” she says coldly. “If you don’t like it-”

“On offer? Offer? That wasn’t an offer! That was groping!”

“You’re a real prude for a guy,” she says. “What’s the matter with you? Don’t you-”

“Nothing’s the matter with me,” Liam snaps. “I’m gay.”

There’s a long pause. Hayden pulls her hand away slowly, looking mortified - her cheeks are red, and she’s looking away from him.

“Hands off the merchandise,” Liam says faintly. “Jesus. Was that - was that payment, or something?”

“Like I said, I don’t have anything else to give you,” she mumbles.

“I really don’t want you to grope me. I’ll consider it payment if you don’t.”

“I’m so sorry I tried to offer something without knowing you’re _gay!”_ Hayden snaps.

“I wouldn’t fuck you even if I was straight,” Liam mutters.

Hayden glares at him. “Don’t meet your standards?”

“Sure, you’re pretty,” Liam says, “but there’s only room for one salty, jaded, bitterly ill-adjusted person in my relationship, and that’s me.”

There’s a long pause. “So you don’t want anything from me?” Hayden asks.

“Not like that,” Liam says. “And it’s got nothing to do with me being gay, either. I wouldn’t want… that kind of payment even if I was straight.” He glances at her. “Theo makes you do it for food, huh?” he asks.

“Yeah. I hold off for as long as I can. The other girls - and guys - got used to it. I never did.”

“You know that’s rape, right?”

“Yes, I am in fact aware of that,” Hayden snaps, “but you know what? It’s still better than what could happen to me if I left. I might have to exchange blowjobs for food but I’ll never be at risk of - do you even _know_ what the Keepers do to the people they don’t kill and eat?”

Liam remembers the Keeper - his sour, damp breath, his heavy breathing, the crushing weight of him slung over Liam’s back, the slide of a belt buckle being opened, the snick of a zipper going down. The knife at his throat. How small and helpless he felt.

He doesn’t answer. He looks away from her.

There’s a long silence. Her hand touches his knee lightly, uncertainly. It jerks underneath her fingers before he slams his foot back against the ground stubbornly.

“They did it to you,” she says softly.

“Almost,” he replies stoically.

“How… how old…?”

“Seventeen.”

He hears the gust of breath leave her lungs, like she’s shocked for some reason. “How did you get away?”

“I got lucky. That’s it.”

There’s a long pause. Hayden leaves her hand on his knee, and slowly, but surely, he starts to relax under it, acclimatise to her presence at his side. “How old are you now?” she asks.

“Eighteen.”

She shakes her head. “You look older,” she offers.

“Guess that’s a bonus.” He realises he’s meant to ask her as well. “You?”

“Almost twenty. I’m sorry about what happened to you.”

“Nothing happened to me.”

“What almost happened to you, then.”

“Thanks,” he mumbles awkwardly. “Me too. For you I mean. I’m sorry.”

She nods.

They sit in silence for a while. Liam rubs Fudge’s ears absently, trying to think of some way to show her she doesn’t have to worry about him - as a threat to her life or otherwise.

He reaches into his backpack and pulls out a bag of jellybeans. “Want some?” he asks.

She stares at him. “Where…?”

“A Rite-Aid. They’re still good.”

She takes some; Liam puts the bag between them and begins picking out the orange ones. Hayden gives him a strange look, but he knows she won’t stop him; no one likes the orange flavour of anything.

“I’ll help you find them,” she says.

“Huh?”

“Your friends? The other guys? I’ll help you find them. I know the place pretty well.”

“Thanks,” he murmurs, relieved to have her help on it. “That’d be great. I… kind of don’t even know where to start.”

She gives him a small smile.

“They’re good guys, you know,” he says softly. “They aren’t like Theo or the Keepers. You wanna stay with us? I mean I’d have to ask first, like, there would be a vote, but…”

“How can I know you’re telling the truth?” she asks reluctantly.

“Two of them I was with at the start of the outbreak,” Liam says, “and they’d never hurt anyone. 'Specially not Vinnie. And the other, uh…”

She grins suddenly. “The other’s your boyfriend, huh?”

Liam rubs the back of his neck. “Yeah,” he mumbles.

“Which one?”

“The tall blonde one. Brett. His name’s Brett.”

“He’s cute,” she says.

“Thanks. I think so too.”

She laughs, which he really wasn’t expecting, but is glad to hear anyway. “How long have you guys been together?”

“Travelling? Or…?”

“Both, I guess.”

“Met him… Jesus, must be almost a year ago now. Together… I guess eight months? Nine? Kinda hard to keep count when you’re just counting down till your next meal, you know?”

She nods. “He sounds good,” she murmurs.

Liam swallows. “Yeah. He is.”

~*~

_He wakes up with the realisation that it’s the anniversary of Garrett’s death. The second year._

_Brett’s lying next to him, his arm thrown over Liam’s waist. For the first time ever, Liam feels squeamish about it; he pushes Brett’s arm off and rolls out of bed straight away._

_It somehow hits him, then; he’s eighteen years old. He’s two years older than Garrett ever was and ever will be. Despite all the shit that’s happened to him along the way… he’s here._

_He’d thought Garrett was so much older than him - a full year older, in fact - and so much worldlier. Now he’s been two ages Garrett hasn’t, and he feels wrong for it._

_He should be here with me, Liam thinks blankly as he heads into the kitchen. He should be here._

_Fudge puts his head on Liam’s knee when he sits on the couch and whines quietly, his ears back. Liam strokes them until they rise again; he hates upsetting his dog. Especially because he knows it’s because he’s about to dissociate or something, and Fudge will probably rat him out to Brett._

_His stomach turns guiltily. Brett’s been his safe harbor for almost a year now; if something happened to him, Liam doesn’t know what he’d do. God forbid he gets bit, like Garrett did, and Liam has to…_

_He swallows, closes his eyes, then stands up and leaves the house. It’s true that Brett’s his safe place. But not today; today, he feels guilty for even loving Brett, like a true test of his love for Garrett is to see how long he refuses to move on. And isn’t that what he did? In Ashburton? Refuse to move on, hope that Mason showed up there like they had all originally planned? Isn’t that what he was doing before Brett showed up?_

_Was I even done mourning? Liam wonders confusedly. I was there for a year and a half. I should have been. I should’ve been done…_

_He doesn’t know where he’s going until he gets there; it’s a secluded spot, away from the bustle of the main town, right near the walls. He sits down in the grass, and Fudge flops next to him, on his side._

_He’s out there for a long time, just thinking. Sure, Garrett could be shitty about a long of things - he was often too quick to snap, accuse, and blame, and he was generally a selfish lover, but in some ways, he was good. In the beginning of the outbreak, he always made sure Liam was safe, warm; that he had enough to eat and drink. He wasn’t all bad. Not even close._

_“There you are.”_

_Liam turns a little, but he doesn’t need to look to know it’s Brett, just from his voice. He ducks his head as Brett comes over and settles into the long, tall grass next to him._

_There’s a long silence. Fudge’s paws are twitching; he’s probably chasing rabbits in his dreams. At least, Liam hopes that’s what he’s doing, and not running from zombies._

_“So,” Brett says softly. “What’re you doing all the way out here, huh? Took me ages to find you.”_

_Liam shrugs, his throat tight. He doesn’t think he can speak without crying, and for some reason, he really doesn’t want to cry in front of Brett. On his own, sure. But not in front of Brett, not today. It feels wrong somehow._

_Brett leans back on the palms of his hands. “I’ve never seen this side before,” he says. “Is this some well-kept wall scout secret or something? It’s beautiful.”_

_It is beautiful. The grass is tall and long, brushing Liam’s elbows, and bright green with health. The walls are almost totally obscured by huge trees and flowering bushes, and the light that filters between them is just warm enough and golden enough that Liam doesn’t need a jacket. It’s incredibly peaceful._

_It hits him, then, that the last thing Garrett ever saw was the dingy interior of an abandoned apartment, and his chest quakes with the pain of it - he suddenly feels like there’s a little ball molten lava in there, burning right through him, and he turns his head completely away from Brett as his eyes overflow._

_There’s a long pause. “Do you want me to go?” Brett asks softly._

_Liam shakes his head._

_“Okay. I’ll stay.”_

_There’s another long silence. After a few minutes, Brett reaches out and puts his hand on Liam’s back - and, when Liam doesn’t shrug him off, starts rubbing it slowly, like Liam’s sick and convalescent. Maybe he is._

_Liam eventually turns his head back a little bit; Brett doesn’t make it obvious, but Liam knows his quick lean forward is to examine Liam’s face for tears. There’s plenty there for him to find._

_“How long have you been out here?” Brett asks softly._

_Liam shrugs, lifts a hand to wipe at his eyes discreetly. He’s never hidden his crying from Brett before, and he’s not sure why he’s starting now. It feels kind of wrong to cry about his ex in front of his current boyfriend, though._

_“You don’t have to hide from me, Liam,” Brett murmurs. “Whatever it is. You don’t have to hide it from me.”_

_Liam wipes his eyes again with his sleeves - they’re sopping wet by now. “Today,” he says, and his voice is fucking wrecked - he sounds like he’s been gargling nails - and it breaks as he speaks. He clears his throat a little._

_“Today?” Brett asks quietly._

_Liam swallows. “Today - it’s the anniversary.”_

_There’s a pause. Brett doesn’t get it. That’s when Liam realises that so many people have died, he could be talking about anyone._

_“Garrett,” he adds, and his voice breaks again. “It - it’s been two years since-”_

_He doesn’t get any further. Brett shuffles closer and puts his arm around Liam’s shoulders, almost rocks him as Liam gives himself over to the crushing, awful waves of emotion and just cries. He’s quiet, at least, but it’s still embarrassing to be rocked like a little kid._

_“It still hurts,” Liam admits. “I think about him every day, Brett. And it still hurts.”_

_Brett nods, his eyes soft and sympathetic._

_“Is it ever gonna stop?” Liam asks weakly. “Am I ever gonna be able to think about him and not want to cry?”_

_Brett tilts his head; his eyes have gone impossibly tender. “It’s always going to hurt,” he says. “But you’re gonna learn to live with it eventually. You’ll learn to cope.”_

_“I don’t want to learn to cope or live with it. I want it to go away.”_

_“That would mean forgetting him entirely,” Brett murmurs. “And somehow, I don’t think you wanna do that either.”_

_Liam shakes his head, wipes his eyes._

_“I wish we could go visit his grave,” Brett murmurs. “It helps.”_

_Liam tries to smile. “He doesn’t have one.”_

_“Huh?”_

_“I couldn’t - there was nowhere to bury him. It was just some fucking - we were in the middle of a city. There wasn’t any ground anywhere. And I couldn’t move him anywhere. So he’s still just…” His chest shudders warningly, and he stops talking, takes a deep breath, feels like he has to justify himself somehow. “I wanted to, Brett. I wanted to give him a proper burial or something but I-”_

_“Hey,” Brett murmurs. “It’s okay.”_

_Liam nods._

_“You wanna know something?” Brett asks._

_“Sure.” This time, when Brett goes to wipe his eyes, Liam lets him. Maybe he even reaches up to hold Brett’s wrist, to ground himself._

_“When my dad died,” Brett says softly, “I didn’t want to go to the funeral. Mom made me of course. I refused to get out of the car the whole time. I never went to his grave. Not once.”_

_Liam sniffles a little, looks up. “Do you regret it?”_

_Brett nods. “Wish I hadn’t been a dumb kid.”_

_“Sounds like you were scared, not dumb.”_

_Brett sighs. “Maybe. Look, the point is… people grieve differently. If you’re okay three hundred and sixty four days of the year, and on the three hundred and sixty fifth you break down and have a cry and mourn for him, nobody’s going to begrudge you that, or think any less of you.”_

_“Do you?” Liam asks, his voice breaking._

_“Of course I don’t.” Brett strokes his neck. “I never could have done for him what you did for him. You’re brave.”_

_Liam nods, feeling a little more at ease._

_Brett stands up. “Wait here,” he says. “I’ll be back soon.”_

_Liam waits. He lies down on the grass with his head on Fudge’s stomach and stares up at the clouds passing overhead, hears the grass whispering around him. For a moment, he feels like Garrett’s death and everything following it has been a dream; that any moment now, Garrett will be leaning over him and teasing him into getting up._

_Brett comes back, and the fantasy fades. Liam sits up; he’s got an armful of tools and some planks of wood._

_“What’s this?” Liam asks._

_Brett gives him a small smile. “You said you never buried him,” he says. “Doesn’t mean he can’t have some kind of headstone. This is a pretty beautiful place.”_

_Liam tries to smile. “He wasn’t religious.”_

_“Doesn’t have to be a cross. What would he have liked?”_

_Liam wipes his eyes. “Knowing him,” he mumbles, “a giant middle finger.”_

_Brett laughs, and Liam smiles a little wider. “A cross is fine,” he says. “Thanks.” With that, he drags the wood towards himself._

_Brett helps him make it, even though Liam could definitely do it himself; he holds the wood in place while Liam nails it carefully. With that over, Liam searches for his knife to engrave Garrett’s name._

_“Fuck,” he says. “I don’t-”_

_Brett passes his knife over to Liam; Liam smiles a little. “Thanks.”_

_Twenty minutes later, they’re finished; it’s a simple cross, made out of nothing more than two planks of wood, a few nails, and Garrett’s name and date of birth and death underneath. Liam digs a shallow hole to plant it in, and Brett holds it still while he fills in the dirt._

_He looks at the finished product. “Thanks,” he murmurs to Brett, watching as Fudge stands, stretches, and then comes over to the cross, sniffing it curiously._

_“No problem,” Brett says. “Did it help?”_

_“Yeah. Yeah, thank you.” He turns to Brett. “Do you… wanna make one for your dad?”_

_There’s a long pause. Brett nods, and they repeat the process; Brett’s father’s name was Harry. It’s nice. Normal._

_“We should get home,” Brett says softly, having finished erecting his father’s cross. “It’s getting dark.”_

_Liam pushes himself to his feet, feeling exhausted. Brett smiles at him._

_“You want a piggyback?”_

_Liam almost says he’s too old for piggybacks, but fuck it. He nods and climbs on Brett’s back, listening to him grunt as he stands properly._

_“You’re getting a little big to be carried,” Brett mutters._

_“You offered.” He tightens his arms around Brett’s neck. “Thank you.”_

_“Anytime, Li.”_

_All he can think, the whole way home, through the front door, and into their bedroom - even as he’s getting tucked under the covers by a gentle, sympathetic Brett like he’s a little kid - is that he still wouldn’t trade Brett for anything. If it meant Garrett alive, and his Before back… he still wouldn’t do it. Maybe that’s what moving on is._

_Brett crawls into bed behind him. “Get some sleep.”_

_“I will.” He wants to tell Brett he loves him, but he doesn’t, because the timing feels wrong. He just thinks it instead, hopes Brett can hear him somehow. “Goodnight.”_

_“Night, Li.”_

~*~

They move on from the warehouse, leaving Hayden’s chip behind.

Liam knows he probably shouldn’t trust her. But he can’t help it; they’ve both spared one another a few times now, she patched up his hand, and more than that, she’s a kindred spirit. And he can’t help but feel sorry for her, either.

Plus, the lure of her helping him find Brett is too much to overcome; she already knows how many of them there are, and that one is hurt. She’s had the strategic advantage from the get go and hasn’t used it. Liam wants to have faith in her.

They don’t move far. It becomes clear pretty quickly that neither of them are in a position to travel for long distances; Hayden’s exhausted and malnourished, and Liam’s injured - his head is throbbing, his ribs, hip, arm, and back on his left side are all aching fiercely, and he’s limping. Normally, his priority would be to find somewhere he can wash the blood out of his hair and off his skin. Right now, it’s just to find somewhere safe to rest.

By the time they find somewhere safe, Liam’s pretty much panicking. He’s suddenly realised that there isn’t enough daylight to keep searching for the others, that he doesn’t know where to begin - that he doesn’t have the stamina anyway. Hayden’s scared as hell, too; Theo’s definitely realised she’s defected by now.

They find somewhere to hole up for the night - a police station, at the back, near the exits. Liam builds a fire; Hayden finds them actual mattresses from the cells, even blankets. Liam has a bedroll, but it doesn’t matter. Fudge can sleep on it.

“He’s a cute dog,” Hayden says, motioning to him. Fudge is lying next to Liam, gnawing on his rawhide bone. “Where’d you find him?”

“I was looting a pharmacy,” he replies, stroking Fudge’s head fondly. “He growled at me. Thought he was a wolf at first, till I turned around. Anyway, he was just hungry. I fed him, and I was gonna go, but he followed me - he was hurt, right? So I took some glass out of his paw and fixed him up. After that, he followed me.”

Hayden reaches out, pets Fudge’s mantle hesitantly. He turns to lick her hand gratefully, and she smiles. “He’s friendly.”

“Yeah. It’s kind of like a… Well, Liam hasn’t killed you yet, you must be fine thing.”

She laughs. “So you’re the good judge of character?”

“Nah, I’m suspicious of everyone.”

“Me?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s alright. I’m suspicious of you too.”

~*~

They talk a little before retiring to sleep; Liam’s still aching and sore, knows he’ll be worse in the morning. Hayden checks his stitches for him.

Hayden’s parents died before the outbreak, she explains to Liam. Car accident. She lived with her sister, who worked for the Sheriff’s department as a deputy. Things were tough, but they were making it work.

Liam tells her a little about himself. About his mom and stepdad, mostly. But Hayden seems to like talking about her sister, and Liam likes listening.

They go to bed on the same side of the fire as one another; Liam sets his bedroll up for Fudge, but Fudge crowds onto the narrow, single-person mattress with him, resting his head on Liam’s ribcage with a sigh.

They’re quiet. The fire crackles; Liam thinks of Brett. Wonders if he’s safe, warm. Assumes - hopes - that he’s still alive. Tells himself that tomorrow, he’s going to make it to wherever Brett is. And Owen and Vinnie, he supposes, but… mostly Brett.

He sees Hayden shiver and rolls a little, watches. Within the next five seconds, she shivers again.

“Are you cold?” Liam asks quietly.

There’s a long pause from where he knows Hayden is. Then, “Yeah.”

Liam hesitates. He remembers being thin - downright skinny - after getting sick in Ashburton, remembers how hard it was just to get warm in the first place, let alone stay warm. How painful lying on his joints could be. How Brett used to have to wrap himself around Liam just so he could retain heat somehow.

Liam drags his mattress closer to her and sidles up behind her, slowly, so she knows where he is. Fudge follows him with a soft snort.

“What are you doing?” Hayden asks, her voice wary.

“You’re cold because you’re too skinny,” Liam mutters, curling his body around her frame gently. He’s never in his life held a girl like this; she’s softer and thinner where Brett’s broad and hard, and there’s just not as much to hold onto - he’s not sure what to do with his hands, really. She fits against his chest so easily it’s almost frightening.

There’s a long moment of silence. Liam settles with his arm draped over her waist and stomach, a safe distance away from her chest and her hips.

“Thanks,” she says quietly.

“Don’t mention it,” Liam yawns. “Been there, done that.”

“Been skinny? I can’t imagine you ever being skinny.”

Liam nods into the back of her head. There’s a lot of hair back here; he’s trying not to get any in his mouth or nose. “When Brett and I lived in Ashburton, Brett got kidnapped by one of the Keepers,” he explains. “It was just bait for me apparently - I was seventeen then, but I guess I looked younger - but they were gonna turn him into their next buffet.”

Hayden shudders. “How’d you get out of that?”

“I went and found him. I’m good at tracking. Anyway, I tracked him down and found him, almost got him free before the Keeper came back. We got into a fight. He stabbed me.” Liam finds the spot he was stabbed on her ribcage and presses. “Here.”

She rolls to face him, looking stunned. “You were _stabbed?”_

“Mm.” He pulls his shirt up to show her the scar. “Wasn’t a big knife. Anyway, I knocked him out. Brett carried me home, stopped the bleeding, got me stitched up. I mean, I got lucky, at least from what I understand. The knife didn’t, you know, fuck up my organs or arteries, just kind of… glanced off a rib and sliced through the muscles. But I lost a lot of blood really fast - Brett told me it wasn’t that bad but I knew it was - and the knife had been fucking God knows where before it was used to shank me.”

Hayden touches the weal of the scar, wincing as she does. “So what happened?”

“I got sick. Really bad infection. Brett did everything he could to clean it out as soon as we got back, but he couldn’t get right in there - doused it in saltwater, God, I’m never gonna forget that. Worst pain I’ve ever been in. Disinfected it. But I think it was… maybe not even five hours later I had a fever.”

“People who get infections usually die,” Hayden points out. “So what happened? Because nobody recovers from something like that without medication.”

“Well yeah. Brett went to the hospital. He wasn’t sure what was causing the infection, so he got two drugs that did different things and got me started on both of them. Had to put an IV line in me and everything. But it worked, because I’m still here. Anyway, though - I was on, uh, Meropenem and Vancomycin for the infection, and codeine for the pain. The codeine made me so sick I could barely eat. Lost a lot of weight. I just remember being really cold and tired all the time.”

“You’re okay now, though.”

“Yeah. All better. Doesn’t hurt anymore. Put all the weight back on and then some.”

“You must really hate the Keepers.”

“If Theo was on fire I wouldn’t piss on him to put it out, sure.”

“That’s disgusting.” But he can hear the smile in her voice. “Thanks. For keeping me warm.”

“No problem. Just… don’t try to repay me.”

“Oh, come on.” She’s giggling now. “That was a one off. I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”

He kind of hates himself for it, but he likes her. Even though she could definitely be playing him still, even though liking people is dangerous, what with the habit they have of getting killed or bitten or otherwise dying on him.

But for now, he’s not alone, and he’s warm, and he’s got at least an idea of what to do next. And that’s good.

~*~

When he wakes up, he’s in pain.

He groans as he turns; Hayden’s gone from her mattress, but she’s near the fire, watching him concernedly.

Liam’s feeling pretty determined not to let the fact that he’s in pain show. He starts to sit up, slowly, wincing. His whole left side is one big bruise, pretty much, and it’s aching accordingly - right down to his bones, which he really should have expected after falling fifteen feet from a balcony.

His arm is pretty bad - not good news, given that it’s his left. He keeps it close to his body, his stomach turning when he looks down and sees that it’s dark purple and swollen from the impact. Nothing’s broken, but he’s not going to be one colour for a while, either.

“Are you going to be okay to move today?” Hayden asks quietly.

“Have to be.” Liam grunts as he finally sits up properly. “Gotta find the others.” He grimaces when he turns his head and feels dried blood crackling across the skin on his neck. “Does the water here work?”

She shakes her head. “I already checked. You could use the bottled stuff.”

“Too hard to find. It’s not worth wasting it.” He moves to the edge of the mattress - the fall feels like it knocked his muscles right out of place, and his lower back is aching fiercely. “Fuck me,” he groans. “I don’t even feel human.”

She eyes him sympathetically. “Maybe we’ll find a place with working water,” she says.

“Hope so. Hope Brett and the others did.”

“Do you think they would’ve?”

“He would’ve looked for somewhere with access to water,” Liam mumbles, sliding over to the fire carefully and taking the bowl of oatmeal Hayden passes him. “For Owen’s leg.”

She nods. “Probably a hospital, then. Or a hotel somewhere. They had water right up till the end. Some of them still do.”

“Right,” he says tiredly.

She looks almost nervous when she speaks again. “I don’t think you’re good to travel,” she confesses softly. “Liam, you… you look awful.”

“I look like a fucking Dalmatian, that’s that I look like. A really fucked up, lopsided Dalmatian. And I don’t have a choice. I’m not gonna get better with another night’s sleep, so we have to keep moving.”

“Okay,” she agrees reluctantly. “But… we should stop for rests.”

“Yeah.” He peers outside. “It’s too hot not to anyway.”

There’s a big difference, Liam’s learned, in late spring in River’s End and out here, in this small city. There’s a breeze in River’s End that must come somewhere off an ocean or mountain; it keeps things relatively cool, and there’s no pavement.

Here, the air is dead, and the concrete heats up quickly once the sun has risen. It must be almost ninety degrees already, and while that wouldn’t be a problem in River’s End or even Warranwood, it is here - the same way it was in Ashburton.

“Can’t wait to get the fuck out of this joint,” he mutters.

“Are you going somewhere?” Hayden asks curiously.

“Nowhere in particular.” It doesn’t sound like a lie, even to his own ears, even though he does feel sort of bad about it. But they gave too much away to Owen and Vinnie too soon, and he recognises that now. He’s not making the same mistake again, and if the others vote to not have Hayden continue with them…

His stomach clenches uncomfortably. If they decide not to, well, he’s not sure what he’ll do. Hayden’s risked her life to help him, to help him help them; if they ditch her now, she’s got nowhere to go, no resources, and she’ll be totally at Theo’s mercy.

_Brett won’t vote to leave her behind unless she gives him a reason to_ , he reassures himself. _And Owen and Vinnie…_

He’s not even sure he wants to travel with them after this. They were fine before; things weren’t dangerous before, or, at least, they weren’t as dangerous. It’s kind of a sliding scale of fucked up to even more fucked up now, but…

_Owen’s changed_ , he reminds himself. He thinks killing the biters now is a game. _And Vinnie… what the fuck is going on with Vinnie?_

They’ve only been travelling for an hour when Liam realises his leg is definitely on the verge of giving out; Hayden’s stayed pretty close to him, only occasionally falling behind when the gaps between cars has narrowed significantly.

“Liam?” she asks softly.

He’s leaning against one of the cars, bent over a little, begging his left leg not to buckle. “Yeah,” he croaks.

“Your leg?” she asks softly.

He nods, swallowing. “Just gimme a few minutes.”

She looks relieved as she opens a car door, checks inside it, and then sits down; Liam opts to do the same. “I’m tired too,” she murmurs.

He pushes his bag towards her with his foot. “Have some food.”

“Liam-”

“If you pass out, I can’t carry you. Eat something.”

So she does. Liam drinks some water - gives some to Fudge, pouring it into his cupped hand. They don’t have containers, and Fudge is clearly thirsty. He looks up at Liam gratefully as he laps water out of Liam’s hand, and Liam smiles, using the other to stroke his ears. Fuck, he loves this dog.

“So… you and that other guy,” Hayden says.

“Brett,” Liam fills in for her.

“Yeah. How’d that happen?”

“Was right after I got shanked.” Liam straightens up a little, gives Fudge some kibble. “I’d been out for a bit - it was before I got really bad though - and I finally kind of, I dunno, I came round a little before the fever got worse. I don’t remember it very well. But yeah. He was pretty happy I was alive I guess.”

Hayden smiles. “You’re lucky to have him.”

“Yeah,” Liam replies sincerely. “I am. Which is why I gotta find him.”

“We’ll find him,” she says. “Are you okay to keep moving?”

He nods and stands up; his leg feels shaky, but not like it’ll give way. “Let’s go.”

Keeping Brett in mind keeps him going; if he can find where Brett is, maybe he and Hayden can loop back to the car at some point, get the medical supplies Owen probably really needs.

“Jesus,” he murmurs.

They’ve just entered a new part of town; there are whole buildings blown to smithereens, rubble everywhere, cars crashed into posts and lights and each other.

Hayden nods. “This happened to a lot of places,” she murmurs. “Just… when the military was trying to take out the biters. There were casualties.”

Liam nods. The next hour is spent in silence; Liam and Hayden are both focussed on searching for a safe way through the rubble and debris without cutting themselves. Liam shivers, thinking about the kind of infection they could get from it.

“How’d you get separated?”

Liam turns to look at Hayden; they’re picking their way through the debris on the road carefully, slowly, watching for any potential biters in the wreckage.

“From Brett?” he asks.

She nods. “It sounds like you were travelling with just him for a really long time,” she adds. “Something must have changed.”

“It did.” He pauses, readjusts his grip on his crossbow, wincing - his side is giving him grief still, and his left leg feels a little weaker at his hip. “We got here about a week ago. We were scavenging for supplies, looking for a safe spot to stay - it’s kind of our thing, right? We have a routine. It’s never failed us before.”

“It must have,” she says slowly. “You got split up.”

Liam shakes his head, then stops and sits down on a nearby blockade. Hayden joins him, looking a little nervous.

“It didn’t fail us,” he says softly. “I did.”

“What do you mean?”

He rubs his face. “We were doing fine together,” he admits. “But - well, we ran into some guys I used to know from before I met Brett. They were good guys back then, and they protected me - I was kind of a timid kid, you know? I was fifteen when the outbreak hit, and I probably would’ve died really early on if it weren’t for them.”

“You got separated?”

“Shit happens,” Liam says, which is the easiest way to gloss over Garrett’s death and everything that happened subsequently. “This is the first time I’ve seen them in almost three years. I just kind of - I let my guard down. I never do that; I never let my guard down, but I did, because I knew them then and I just assumed… I dunno what I assumed. That they were still safe to be around, or that they were still reliable. Even after one of them nearly killed Brett three times-”

“Three times?” Hayden demands. “And you stayed?”

_And I stayed_ , Liam thinks blankly. He’s kicking himself; they should’ve left after the first time, or at the very least, the second. He’s beginning to realise that Brett put his faith in Liam’s judgment, like he always does, like he’s always been able to safely do before - and Liam let him down. Thought with his heart instead of his head. Forgot, somehow, that things have changed; that not everyone who was good still is.

“We stayed,” Liam says quietly. “Turns out the Keepers have some sort of beef with Owen and Vinnie. Looks personal. Brett and I, we’ve had run-ins with the Keepers before - way too many times - but it’s never been personal, you know what I mean?”

“It’s always just been because you’re there, not because of who you are,” Hayden says, and Liam nods.

“Yeah. But they shot at us the moment they realised we were with Owen and Vin.” Liam shakes his head irritably. “Should’ve known something was up. Brett did. Pointed out that we hadn’t moved in days, even though there was no reason not to - I dunno about you, but we have a pretty general "keep moving unless someone’s hurt or sick or it’s not safe” rule, and none of those things were happening. I was so-“

He pauses here, but Hayden nudges him encouragingly.

"I was so fucking strung out,” Liam says, feeling frazzled. “I still am. And I don’t think well when I’m like that. So the whole time we weren’t moving, all I could think about was _are they gonna try and kill Brett again? What’s going to happen next? How can I make sure they can’t get close enough?_ I’m barely thinking ahead right now, and that’s really bad.”

“You’ve thought about getting back-”

“That’s not enough. It’s not. I haven’t even worked out what I’ll do when I get there, like - what I really want to do is just get Brett and Fudge and get the fuck out of here. We’re safer on our own, we always have been, but - I dunno if I can do that to Owen and Vinnie. The Keepers hate them, so they can’t be all that bad.”

“The enemy of my enemy is not my friend,” she says softly. “You’re assuming the Keepers were bad right from the get-go - that they were always evil, always slave traders, always cannibals. But what if they weren’t?”

“Sure as shit doesn’t excuse what they’ve done,” Liam mutters heatedly.

“No, I’m not saying that,” she says, narrowing her eyes at him. “Look, how much do you know about the Keepers?”

“Not much,” Liam says. “I was in Ashburton for a while. They had a base there. They used to take in travellers but…”

He stops. Hayden watches him.

“They used to take in travellers,” Liam says blankly. “Fuck, how did I forget that? You’re right. They took in travellers for a while, for a long time - it was only at some point they started getting kind of, you know, fucked up.”

Hayden nods. “They’ve run the slave-trading network for about a year and a half now,” she says. “But before that, nobody had ever heard of them. Except for you, by the sounds of it. So have you considered that Vinnie and Owen might be worse than the Keepers, and they only didn’t kill you for the same reasons you didn’t kill them - because you used to work together?”

Liam feels like someone’s doused him in ice water. “Then that won’t stop them from hurting Brett,” he says, and stands up, grabs his things. “We’ve gotta get there.”

“We?” Hayden asks uncertainly. “You’re taking me with you? I thought it had to be put to a vote.”

Liam hesitates. Is he really going to do this again? Trust someone when he shouldn’t, when she was working with the Keepers? But - she’s let him go, then given Theo wrong directions to give him time, and then come to warn them that Theo will keep looking for them, at risk to herself. He’s taken her chip out, so she can’t be tracked.

“I don’t have time to ditch you,” he says. His throat is tight with fear. “I just need to get back.”

“Okay,” she says. “This way.”

~*~

Liam narrows it down: Owen’s hurt, and Brett will try to save his life. That means they’ll either be at a hospital or a pharmacy - or, at the very least, located nearby.

Owen’s leg is injured, and he’d be too heavy to carry. That means two things: one, they probably haven’t gone upstairs anywhere, and two, they probably haven’t gone far from the warehouse. It’s Hayden who suggests going back there - saying that if Owen’s bleeding and they were forced to move, there might be a trail of blood they can follow.

Liam’s not expecting a lucky break; everything about the last few days has been fucked up and wrong, and it’s because of him. Because he trusted people blindly when he shouldn’t have. So when Fudge whines, puts his paws up against the back exit of the warehouse, and begins scratching it furiously, he doesn’t think much of it.

“Your dog’s losing it,” Hayden comments.

It is kind of annoying; his head is pounding, he’s sweating, and his entire left side is in some form of pain. “Fudge,” he says tiredly. “C'mon, cut it out.”

Fudge doesn’t; he keeps clawing at the door, whining. When Liam fails to respond to that, he stops, turns, barks once, and keeps going.

That gets Liam’s attention; he goes over, and, after listening intently at the door - for zombies - opens it. Fudge darts through, nose on the ground, and almost immediately bears left.

“What’s he doing?” Hayden asks.

Liam blinks. “He’s…”

He’s tracking, Liam realises. He’s taught Fudge to track rabbits and pick up on the scent of biters, sure, but he didn’t think Fudge would be smart enough to know that Brett being missing isn’t right.

“He’s tracking,” Liam says. “I’m not sure if it’s Brett or Owen, but-”

“Do you have anything of Brett’s?” Hayden interrupts.

Liam thinks about it - then drops his pack and roots around in it desperately, hoping that what he’s looking for is still in there.

He’s in luck; he produces the purple bandana Brett gave him months ago, to protect him from contracting the disease spreading through River’s End like wildfire. He never took it out, and he never washed it, either. When he sniffs it gingerly, it still smells distinctly like Brett, even to him - and he’s got a terrible sense of smell.

“Fudge,” he calls.

Fudge returns to him quickly, and Liam sticks the bandana under his nose, holding his breath. Fudge sniffs it eagerly, deeply, before turning in a circle and yelping softly, heading off in the direction he’d started in originally.

Liam grins. “Let’s go.”

~*~

Fudge’s nose leads them a few places.

The first is an alleyway. There’s blood on the ground; they had to have stopped here, probably so Brett could do a better patch job.

The second is a park, around a picnic table. There’s no blood, but Fudge climbs right up onto it and sniffs around, gives a soft yelp; Brett was here, probably sitting down. Liam realises they must’ve been stopping to rest as well; it’s too hot not to, especially with an injured person in tow.

“He’s good,” Hayden says. “Did you teach him?”

“Yeah. Well, I taught him how to find rabbits, and how to tell me where they were - and about zombies. I knew he could track, I just didn’t know he could do it like this.” He rubs Fudge’s head briefly. “Smart pooch,” he murmurs.

“If they’re still moving,” Hayden says kindly, “then Brett’s probably fine, right? If two of them were hurt, there’s no way they’d move.”

He feels a little better about that. And anyway, there’s no way Owen or Vinnie would do anything to Brett with Owen’s life depending on Brett’s medical knowledge.

They’ve walked for another five or ten minutes when Liam feels pain shoot through his hip; he stops, leans on a tree, tries to catch his breath. Hayden doesn’t notice - she’s ahead of him - but Fudge must hear his breathing change, because he drops the scent he’s following and trots back to Liam, whining.

Hayden turns when she sees Fudge move past her. “Are you okay?” she asks hesitantly.

Liam chews the inside of his mouth. “I think I’ve really fucked my leg, or my hip, or my something in that fall,” he hisses, wincing as he straightens out. “It was alright yesterday. Resting on it made it worse.”

She nods; her hands are fluttering helplessly near his shoulder. “Do you need help?”

He pauses, puts weight back on his leg. “Uh,” he mumbles. “No, I think it’s - I’ll take some Tylenol for it, then we can keep going.”

He takes the pills, gives them a few minutes to work - Hayden says nothing about him not being well enough to move, which he appreciates - and then lets Fudge scent the bandana again. He’s been pacing anxiously, obviously wanting to get going again.

Another twenty minutes later, Liam’s really starting to think Fudge is leading them in a wild goose chase - until he stops right outside an intersection and turns in a circle.

That’s when Liam sees it. A hospital, soaring - God, it must be at least six, seven storeys high, all big and modern with large windows and weird architecture.

“Does it have to be this one?” he asks Fudge tiredly.

Fudge barks once and races towards it, then up the steps. Liam and Hayden follow; there are a few biters around, but they’re slow, and so Liam only dispatches the ones he needs to - two near the hospital entrance, another that’s a little too close to Hayden for comfort.

“You’re a really good shot,” she murmurs.

“I’ve had lots of practice.” Liam groans as he starts up the steps. “Brett better be on the first fucking floor of this place.”

“Where else would he be?”

“Knowing him,” Liam says, “the least accessible part of the hospital. Which would be the back wing of the top floor.”

“… Well, let’s hope he’s not there.”


	28. Chapter Twenty Eight - Nowhere To Hide

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i did a bad thing and abandoned this for like two months i'm so sorry T_T
> 
> **trigger warnings for this chapter: mentions of rape**. read safely  <3

**Chapter Twenty Eight - Nowhere To Hide**

Brett hardly has the time to be devastated about Liam’s absence for the first few hours.

He’s trying to keep Owen alive. Trying to keep the wound from bleeding out, staunch the flow, get it packed with bandages, trying to work out if the bullet passed through or whether it’s lodged inside still and he’s not even sure why that matters, because he wouldn’t know how to get it out anyway. It just means one less hole to deal with.

It takes almost half an hour to stop the bleeding; by the time he does, Owen’s clearly sinking into shock, and Vinnie’s stopped being responsive and therefore stopped being anything to Brett other than yet another person to keep an eye on.

He goes into autopilot like he has before, at the hospital - he gets a bag under Owen’s legs to elevate his feet, remembering when he did it for Liam after he came back injured. His stomach lurches - not with the memory, but with the reminder that Liam isn’t here with him.

He bites his lip. He wants to go out and look. He can’t. That’s just a fact - Owen could die without someone watching him and maintaining him, and Vinnie - Brett doesn’t know what the fuck is up with Vinnie. It doesn’t seem like dissociation, at least not the kind Brett’s seen in Liam, but he’s also clearly not occupying the same plane of existence he and Owen are, either.

He manages to get Owen to eat and drink a little, which is good. He guides Vinnie onto a crate and checks the entryways and windows; he can hear groaning, but it’s distant. Most of the zombies have moved away, evidently drawn by Liam - or something else, maybe.

Either way, it doesn’t matter. The sun is pounding down, swelteringly hot, and Brett’s sweating pretty badly. He can only hope Liam manages to take shelter somewhere - he might’ve grown up in Texas and California, but nobody is immune to heatstroke. The sun can be just as bad as the cold, not that anyone seems to remember that.

Eventually, without anything else to do, he sits down near Owen. He needs to go find the car - get medical supplies. But he can’t leave. Vinnie’s able-bodied, but completely out of it; Owen’s unable to walk, but has his wits about him. Unfortunately, it’s not enough to make a team.

“You shouldn’t have let him go.”

Brett looks up at Owen, feeling a surge of anger lick up into his chest. “Let him go?” he asks disbelievingly. “I couldn’t fucking stop him. Have you even met him?”

“He’s a kid-”

“Christ.” Brett rubs his face. “He’s not a kid,” he snaps. “He turned eighteen months ago now. He’s an adult, technically speaking, and he was way before he hit some arbitrary milestone. What did you want me to do? Yank him back in?”

“Something like that,” Owen mutters. “Instead of letting him run off on his own.”

“Look,” Brett says quietly. “I’m not his fucking keeper. I’m not his dad or his brother or his supervisor. He’s my partner. We make decisions for one another - this time, Liam judged that we’re safer here and that he had enough time and energy to lead the herd away from us, and he made the call. I’m not gonna shake my head and tut at him for it. He’s got good instincts and great survival skills.”

Good instincts. His stomach turns a little; Liam’s instincts clearly short-circuited the moment he knew Owen and Vinnie were alive. And Brett wants to be angry about that, he does, but…

But he can’t be angry with Liam, knowing he’d have done exactly the same thing in Liam’s position, knowing that Liam potentially sacrificed his life to make sure that everyone in this room would be alright. He can’t be mad at Liam. What he said to Owen is true; Liam’s an adult, he’s got good instincts, and he knows how to survive. He’s not a kid. But he is young, and sometimes Brett forgets that.

“You don’t get it,” Owen says. He looks awful; he’s lost a huge amount of blood, and Brett’s not sure there’s much he can do about it without medical supplies.

“Don’t get what?”

“When we met up with him and Garrett,” Owen rasps. “Man, you don’t know what he was like back then. He was scared of his own fucking shadow, and that was _before_ things got bad. Garrett was the tough one. He carried them both. Vin and I swore we’d never let anything happen to either of them, but at the end of the day… well, it wasn’t up to us, you know?”

Scared of his own shadow. That’s so unlike Liam Brett has a hard time visualising it.

“He was a fucking wreck when Garrett got bit,” Owen breathes. “Couldn’t get him to move - he straight-up fainted when we amputated the kid’s arm. Couldn’t get him to talk for a while either. Only reason I stayed with him and Garrett so long before I went and found Vin was because I thought Liam was gonna shove a gun in his mouth and pull the trigger.”

Brett winces at the visual. “Could you not say stuff like that?” he asks.

“Why? Oh, right. He pretty much carries you.”

“Not gonna dispute that,” Brett says, keeping his voice level. “But that’s not why. I really love the stupid kid and the image of him blowing his brains out isn’t exactly one I want to ruminate on.”

Owen lifts his head, groans, and lies still. “What the fuck does ruminate mean?”

“Reflect,” Vinnie says, and they both startle. Brett looks, but Vinnie’s gone blank like speaking was just an errant spark of electricity, lost in a broken system. He shakes his head a little; Owen should be worrying about Vinnie, not Liam.

“And dude,” Owen says. “Love? Seriously?”

“Is that a difficult concept for you to grasp?” Brett snarks - and realises, a second later, that he sounds exactly like Liam does.

“Loving people now is dangerous, man,” Owen says.

Brett shakes his head. “He didn’t give me a choice,” he mutters. “I was doing fine until he went and got shanked and I spent days thinking he was gonna croak. I was totally fucked after that.”

“And now?” Owen asks. “‘Cause he’s out there with thousands of munchers and the fuckin’ Keepers, dude. Probably had better chances when he was stabbed.”

Brett swallows. He remembers how Liam looked at him, just before tossing him the shotgun - longingly. Like he wanted nothing more than to follow Brett into the warehouse and stay with him, no matter what that might have meant for all of them.

_I’m right behind you_ , he’d said. But it’s been hours, and he’s nowhere to be seen. Brett’s gut clenches, agonisingly slow, hard, like there’s a rock in there he can’t digest.

The truth is, Liam’s had plenty of time to lead the herd away from them and circle back - he moves fast, and he doesn’t make stupid choices. Which means one of three things: one, Liam’s injured and can’t actually get back to them. Two, Liam’s been caught by the Keepers. Or three… he’s been caught by the herd.

Brett swallows. For a moment, he forgets Owen is even there; he puts his head in his hands and tries not to cry. Liam could be injured and desperately needing help, and Brett doesn’t know where he is. And once that thought has entered his head, he’s thinking of Liam, waiting and hoping Brett’s going to show up and patch him up and bring him home like he always has, except Brett won’t be turning up.

_We can’t put out a signal_ , he thinks despairingly. _The Keepers might see it. Or Liam wouldn’t be able to make it back anyway…_

“You go look for 'im,” Owen breathes.

Brett lifts his head, shakes it, tries to clear it. “No,” he murmurs. “No.”

“Thought you said you loved him,” Owen says coldly.

“I do,” Brett snaps. “You don’t get to be the judge of that. But he left me here with you two to take care of you. That’s what he wanted. It hasn’t been that long. He might be lying low, just making sure it’s safe to come back.” Even as he says it, Brett realises this is just as much of an option as the first three; Liam might just be biding his time, ensuring he doesn’t lure back Keepers or zombies.

“And what if he can’t find us?” Owen asks.

“He’ll find us,” Brett says shortly. “Or we’ll find him.”

“Okay. What if he can’t find us because he’s dead? Or turned?”

Brett’s stomach lurches. He has to think about that, to consider it; if Liam was bitten immediately after leaving them, then he’s got three days, give or take a few hours, to let the fever settle in and take him. Except Liam won’t do that. Without amputation or access to the Milwaukee Protocol, Brett knows Liam will just end it.

“If he’s turned,” he says, “I’m not leaving until I find him and put him down. You don’t leave people you love like that.”

Owen nods slowly. “That was always his worst fear, you know?” he murmurs tiredly. “Getting bit and turning. Or maybe it was hurting other people. I dunno. But he made us promise him not to let him turn if he got bit.”

Brett swallows.

~*~

_Liam’s breathing has been so laboured for the last day that Brett doesn’t notice it change when he wakes._

_All he knows is that the sound of it is drilling into his skull, and that he’s so used to it Liam’s pained, startled moan upon regaining consciousness - for the first time in more than a day, no less - totally breaks the fugue of exhaustion that’s settled over Brett’s body and mind._

_He hurries over, asks Liam what hurts, but Liam’s incoherent and can’t tell him; Brett tries to wipe his face and neck, just to cool him down. The fever burns him when he touches Liam. It makes sense when Liam says he wants water, and Brett’s been fighting to get him to drink for so long that he rushes to get the bottle to Liam’s lips, before he changes his mind._

_Liam’s eyes are clouded when they open a little, and he doesn’t really seem to recognise Brett. For a moment, while he drinks, he seems fine - and Brett thinks, that despite the delirium and confusion, that this might be an upswing. But the moment the water bottle’s gone, Liam’s writhing, his muscles contracting, his voicebox choking around a moan of pain._

_“Liam,” he pleads. “You have to tell me what hurts. Is it your stab wound or something else?”_

_Liam’s eyes are looking in his direction, but they’re glazed with fever, and Brett knows Liam’s not really seeing him. “Stab wound?” Liam sobs. “Brett… Brett, I…”_

_Brett waits for Liam to finish his sentence, but it becomes clear that he’s not going to, or can’t. He’s wriggling, and his chest is heaving - it sounds like he’s struggling to even draw breath, and Brett feels his resolve snap._

_He’s been hoping the pain would keep Liam alive, but this… he can’t leave Liam like this. He reaches for an injection or morphine, salvaged from the kit Liam lifted from the Keeper’s body ages ago._

_“No,” Liam whimpers; Brett’s tilting him a little, trying to access his side and hip. “No, I don’t - the stitches-”_

_“It’s not for stitches, Liam,” Brett says helplessly, trying to soothe Liam with a hand on his head. “It’s morphine. It’s just for the pain.”_

_Liam doesn’t talk again; he still looks scared, but he seems too exhausted and weak to try and fight Brett off a second time. Brett takes his chance; he pulls the blanket back - it’s soaked in sweat, fuck - and pushes the needle into Liam’s thigh. Liam squirms a bit, but it’s easy to hold him still with a hand on his hip._

_“Don’t let me turn,” Liam moans._

_Brett freezes for a moment. “What?”_

_“Don’t let me turn,” Liam pleads. His voice is crackling with the strain of speech. “Please don’t let me turn.”_

_Brett’s breath leaves him in a single gust. “Liam, you - you’re not gonna turn, you’re not gonna die-”_

_Liam’s next sound is a quiet but agonised wail. He’s clearly distressed - more distressed than Brett’s ever seen him before - and it’s half an hour before the morphine will start to work and lull Liam into sleep. Brett doesn’t know what to do._

_He slides closer, manages to get Liam’s head and shoulders in an awkward embrace, and tucks Liam’s head against his shoulder. Liam gives a low sob; Brett starts to stroke his hair, helpless to do anything else._

_“You aren’t gonna die, Liam,” he whispers. “Alright? You’re gonna be okay. You’re not gonna turn.”_

_They go back and forth about it for a while. Liam thinks he’s been bitten, and telling him otherwise isn’t helping; the information isn’t making it back to Liam’s brain, isn’t sinking in, and he’s squirming more and more with every passing second, begging Brett not to let him hurt anyone else._

_Brett swallows as he pulls Liam in closer, hoping the contact helps a little. “Shh,” he murmurs. “It’s okay. I’ve got you, it’s okay. Try to go back to sleep.”_

_Liam’s still crying, but not as hard; his breathing is jerky and terrified. Brett’s not sure if he’s run out of energy or if he’s calming down as a result of the morphine._

_“I won’t let you turn,” he whispers, his voice breaking - and he’s surprised when Liam settles a little more, relaxes back into his arms. With a positive reaction, Brett keeps talking, desperate to calm Liam down, to soothe him._

_“Okay? I won’t - I won’t let you turn, alright? I’ll make sure that doesn’t happen.”_

_Liam’s tongue darts over his lips; they’re cracked and even bleeding in some places. Brett resolves to put balm over them when Liam’s out._

_“Are you sure?” Liam whispers._

_“Yeah.” Brett swallows. “I’m sure. I won’t let you turn.”_

_Liam relaxes. He doesn’t say anything, but his eyes drift tiredly over Brett’s face, and Brett thinks Liam might even be seeing him this time around. The morphine must finally be taking effect. Brett regrets putting it off for so long. This whole episode could have been totally avoided._

_He watches as Liam’s eyes drift shut. “That’s it,” he whispers. “Get some sleep. I won’t let you turn, Liam. I won’t ever let that happen.”_

~*~

“Dude, you alive in there?”

Brett looks up. Owen’s staring at him.

“I know,” he says. His voice sounds startled even to his own ears. “That he doesn’t want to turn. I know.”

Owen gives him an odd look. “Right.”

Hours pass. The sun rises, higher and higher in the sky, and the heat peaks - somewhere that has to be close to a hundred. Brett’s sweating. He thinks of Liam. Even Fudge crosses his mind.

For the first hour, he’s pretty hopeful. Liam said he’d be back soon; that means any minute he’ll be crawling through a window or something.

By the fourth hour, though, Brett’s starting to feel like he’s waiting for a text back from a crush who’s much less interested than he is. There’s no sign of Liam anywhere.

Later that day, Brett thinks about it again. Thinks about whether or not he’d actually be able to do it; would he seriously be able to take a gun or knife to the face of someone he loves and put them down? He doesn’t think so. He hasn’t had to before.

_If it was Liam_ , he thinks, swallowing, _I would have to. I wouldn’t be able to leave him like that. But…_

He rolls over - they’re napping, trying to escape the heat of the day, waiting for Owen to heal. There’s nothing else to do except wait for Liam to get back now.

_How did Liam do it?_ He’s thinking back, now, to the time right after Liam’s eighteenth birthday - when he’d woken up to find Liam gone and searched for him for almost an hour before finding him at the far side of River’s End, crying, almost unable to speak. _How did Liam put Garrett down?_

There are so many things Brett should’ve asked Liam before, and he’s only just realising it now. How did he put Garrett down? How did a fifteen year old manage to escape a zombie-infested city and travel so far to another without incident? How many people did Liam help? How many hurt him in return? He knows almost nothing about the year and a half Liam spent on his own.

He swallows. He’s tired - so tired his eyes are watering with it, that his head is pounding and his eyes are fuzzy, but his mind is racing and no matter what he tries, he can’t get it to stop. Normally, on nights like this - that happen frequently since his bite - he would roll over and plant his face against Liam’s chest and listen to his heartbeat, count the seconds between pulses, until he eventually dropped off.

Owen stirs, groans. Brett slides off his bed - a roll and blanket on the floor - to check on him. Vinnie hasn’t moved in hours. None of them can keep watch - Brett should be, but he’s so tired, and he knows he’ll fall asleep anyway.

_Be okay, Liam_ , he thinks. _Be okay._

~*~

_Liam’s birthday falls on one of his scouting days._

_Which is kind of good for Brett, because it means he has time to put the final touches on Liam’s present - such as it is - and even clean up the house a little bit before he gets home._

_Liam comes home just before noon - he’d left the previous night - looking tired, but happy. Brett doesn’t jump out and yell “surprise!” or anything, though - they’re both still working out what triggers Liam’s panic attacks and dissociative episodes._

_Instead, he greets Liam at the door with a glass of water, a kiss, and a “Welcome home.”_

_Liam smiles at him. His eyes are bruised up from lack of sleep, but he looks content and happy enough. “Hi.”_

_Brett takes his pack. “I have something for you.”_

_Liam looks interested now. “Something for me? Why?” He’s drinking the water thirstily after he says it - it’s warming up a little, and he seems parched._

_“Because,” Brett says, “a little birdy told me it’s your birthday.”_

_“Kira,” Liam sighs, but he’s smiling a little wider now. “Um, yeah.”_

_“You didn’t tell me.”_

_“It felt weird. You know, to say out loud.”_

_Brett wraps him in a hug and kisses the side of his head, not caring that Liam’s a little sweaty and sticky. “Happy birthday,” he murmurs. “Now come open your present.”_

_“Present?” Liam looks confused - a little embarrassed. “You… you didn’t have to-”_

_“Yeah I did. C'mon.”_

_Liam follows him to the couch and sits down; Brett reaches behind it and produces the present. It’s wrapped up in actual birthday paper - Malia found it for him while they were out on a scouting trip that didn’t involve Liam - and has a pink bow on the top._

_“Sorry about the bow,” Brett says, and Liam laughs. “It was the only colour anyone could find.”_

_“Pink’s a manly colour,” Liam reassures him, beginning to pull at the edges._

_“Is it? I can’t wear it. It looks terrible on me.”_

_Liam’s laughing as he peels back the paper. “What’s… wow.”_

_Brett sits back, kind of nervous; he’s spent ages on it, and he hopes it’s good enough. He watches Liam’s fingers skim the figures - Fudge, at the forefront, Scott and Stiles in the back, Kira and Malia and even baby Lori in the front._

_“Hope it’s okay,” Brett murmurs. “Not like I can go out and buy you an XBox game, you know?”_

_Liam swallows thickly. “It’s amazing. Thank you. How did you…”_

_“Practice,” Brett admits. “And I have lots of splinters.”_

_“I’ll kiss them all better.” Liam puts the carving on the coffee table and stares at it. “I love it.”_

_“Yeah?”_

_“Yeah, of course. I can even tell who’s who. And Lori… she’s so little. You’re really good.”_

_Brett nods. “I wanted to include Garrett,” he says softly. “But I… I don’t know what he looked like.”_

_There’s a long pause. Liam’s voice is a little croaky when he speaks next. “He, uh,” he says softly, then clears his throat. “He was blonde. Blue eyes. Not a lot taller than me.”_

_Brett nods. He notices Liam’s eyes getting a little red._

_“I’m sorry,” he says. “I shouldn’t have brought him up-”_

_Liam shakes his head. “It’s fine. It’s just… I’ve been two ages now that he’ll never be. And I kind of spent my last two birthdays alone, so… this is a really nice change.”_

_Brett’s heart feels like it may be physically aching; he’s just about to reach out when Liam turns and slots himself into Brett’s arms, slowly, leaning his forehead against the side of Brett’s neck. Brett rubs his back softly._

_“Thanks, Brett,” Liam whispers._

_“Yeah. Of course.” The sentence feels clunky, like he’s supposed to say something more meaningful than that. “I uh… hope you like it.”_

_Liam leans back a little. He looks fragile, but not unhappy or even particularly sad. “I love it.”_

_Brett smiles a little. “Happy birthday, Liam,” he says, and he wishes, silently, that this was guaranteed to not be the last._

~*~

A grating sound wakes him up.

He’s sitting upright as soon as he hears it; the warehouse is startlingly bright, and the only sound is crickets - at least until he hears footsteps.

He reaches for the shotgun - Liam’s shotgun. Having it feels like Liam’s protecting him even while he’s not here - and, upon remembering Liam, Brett’s heart soars.

_Liam_ , he thinks. _Liam’s the only person who knows where we are. It must be Liam._

“Liam?” he whispers excitedly. “Is that you?”

The silence reverberates back at him. That’s when he realises it’s not Liam - of course it isn’t. Liam wouldn’t walk into a warehouse of three armed men without announcing himself. Even if he did know them.

More footsteps. Brett drags his brain back from Liam, from thoughts of Liam, from his dream. His memory. It’s nearly impossible to do. Liam’s tied so intricately to his soul Brett feels like he’s yanking at every thread of his existence trying not to think about him.

He stands up, looks around. His eyes are adjusting to the brightness after sleep, and his eyesight is blurry. Once it’s finally cleared, he notices two things - one, a body moving away, through the back entrance, and that only Owen’s body is still in his bedroll. He’s still breathing, albeit shallowly.

_Vinnie_ , Brett realises. _What the fuck is he doing?_

“Vinnie,” he hisses, striding forward - but Vinnie’s already vanished outside. Helplessly, Brett follows him, wondering what the fuck he’s doing. He might just be going to piss, but… given that Vinnie’s been catatonic since they got here, pretty much, he doubts it.

He reaches the door, looks outside. There are zombies out here, none that seem to be paying attention; Brett manages to spot Vinnie, already a startling distance away.

“Shit,” he says, and he follows the guy - because what else is he gonna fucking do? It’s pretty clear Vinnie’s not out here to piss - and tries to hurry quietly after him.

He finally catches up to Vinnie about two minutes later - the guy’s really moving now. “Vinnie!” he whisper urgently. “Vin, what are you doing?”

Vinnie doesn’t answer him, so Brett leans forward and grabs his elbow. Vinnie’s a skinny guy - nothing at all like Owen - and he’s easy to pull back. He looks at Brett, startled.

“Lex?” he asks.

Brett opens his mouth, then closes it. “Huh?” he asks eventually.

“You aren’t Lex,” Vinnie says, seeming confused.

_Lex?_ Brett wonders. _Who the fuck is Lex?_

“No,” Brett says. “I’m not. What’re you doing out here?”

Vinnie yanks on his arm. “I need to find Lex,” he insists.

“What?” Brett demands, his voice a whisper-shout. “Hey, guess what, I wanna go and find Liam too, but we can’t always have what we want!”

“Who’s Liam?” Vinnie asks.

Brett stares at him for a moment, trying to work out what the fuck is going on - if Vinnie’s messing with him, or if this is serious. Judging by the blank expression on Vinnie’s face, he’s totally serious - or a great actor.

“Liam,” Brett repeats. “Liam. He’s - he’s your friend. Yours and Owen’s.”

Vinnie frowns at him. “I don’t know anyone named Liam,” he says.

“Do you know who I am?”

“Brett,” Vinnie responds simply. “I gotta go find Lex.”

“No!” Brett hisses, pulling him back again. “No, you can’t.” He doesn’t remember Liam, but somehow, he remembers Brett. What the fuck is going on? “Owen needs us back at the warehouse,” he says. “We need to go now.”

Vinnie hesitates. “But Lex… she…”

“I’m sure she’s okay,” Brett says soothingly, trying to disguise the urgency and desperation with concern. “I’m sure she’s fine. C'mon, Vinnie.”

Vinnie finally follows him, seeming more bemused than before.

Upon turning around and heading back, Brett realises they have a new problem - a few zombies are paying attention to them. More than a few. At least a dozen. He can’t use the shotgun without drawing more to them - or, worse, alerting Keepers to their location.

_We can’t stay here_ , he realises as he hustles Vinnie back to the warehouse. _They’re gonna gang up outside the door. Draw others in closer. We need to move._

Great. At least Vinnie’s not catatonic - clearly not completely sane, but not catatonic, and he can probably be persuaded into helping to move Owen.

Owen’s awake when they get back - pitched up on his elbows and breathing weakly. “Where the fuck did you go?” he croaks.

“I was looking for Lex,” Vinnie says simply, and Owen opens his mouth, shoots a look to Brett, then looks back at Vinnie.

The list of thing that these two apparently didn’t disclose to him and Liam is growing longer and longer with every passing hour, quite literally. Brett knows he needs to talk to them about it - or maybe just Owen, seeing as he doesn’t think Vinnie is going to be making sense anytime soon - but right now, they have more pressing matters at hand.

He starts getting their things together. “We need to go,” he whispers to Owen. “Vinnie wandered out - there are zombies coming this way. Not many, but if they hang around the doors, make enough sound-”

“They’ll draw others in and we’re fucked,” Owen finishes. “But what about Liam?”

Brett’s stomach drops. Liam. If they move, Liam isn’t going to be able to find them - at least not as easily. But they can’t wait any longer, and night will be safer - the Keepers, at least, if they’re around, will be sleeping, and zombies are less active at night.

“I’ll find him,” he says, even as he’s not confident. “If we don’t move now he might not have anything to come back to.”

“Alright.” Owen begins to sit, wincing. “How do you wanna do this?”

They both have to carry Owen, who can’t put any pressure on his injured leg and looks like he’s going to pass out the moment he’s upright. Even then, he’s heavy, and their progress is slow - Brett holds Liam’s shotgun in one hand, pointing it forward.

“Fuck,” Owen moans.

They’re in a narrow alleyway; Brett halts slowly. “What’s wrong?” he whispers.

“My leg-”

“Vinnie, help me put him down.”

Once Owen’s on the ground, Brett can see straight away what the problem is - the bandages are soaked with blood. The wound is bleeding anew.

“Okay,” Brett says. “On the ground. Easy.”

He gets Owen on the ground and opens up his pack, which has a lot of their medical supplies in it - the ones that aren’t in the car, anyway. It only takes him five minutes to rebandage the wound, but he’s sweating nervously the entire time, listening to the errant sounds of a few zombies nearby and praying Vinnie doesn’t go looking for “Lex” again.

They get up and keep moving. Owen barely makes a sound, even though Brett can feel him holding his breath past the pain. It reminds him of Liam - of how Liam just grits his teeth and gets on with it until he physically can’t.

He hopes Liam’s okay. Sheltered somewhere, unhurt, or at least only mildly hurt. Brett thinks he could live with that maybe.

“There,” Vinnie says.

Brett looks up. A hospital - that’s fantastic. If they’re lucky, there won’t be zombies. Maybe there’ll even be medical supplies.

“Alright,” he says. “Let’s do this.”

The steps are the hardest part. He briefly considers settling on the first floor - Liam always scolds him for instinctually moving up when fleeing zombies, because it means getting down somehow - but they need all the distance they can get between the biters and Keepers.

He hopes Liam can find them somehow. But he’s not sure they left enough to go on. When he has time, he’ll go out and look. But…

_We never had a contingency plan_ , Brett realises as they begin to head up the stairs to other levels of the hospital. _We never worked out what to do if we got separated because we never thought it would happen. This is a big city. Liam’s probably tired and hurt. Finding us will be hard._

_How far can he make it on foot at normal speed?_ Brett’s heart sinks - Liam’s fast. Assuming he’s not hurt, Liam could’ve easily covered fifteen miles since they were separated. And that might be in the wrong direction.

They’ve reached the top floor of the hospital; nobody will think to look for them here. The next step is simple - find a ward and beds.

Getting Owen onto a bed proves difficult, but once they have, Brett heads to the bathroom, then turns the tap hesitantly. Some places have running water still, and some even have electricity - backup generators that were never used in the initial outbreak.

The water runs clear; Brett nearly cries, he’s so grateful. This means being able to clean out Owen’s wound properly, which is exactly what he does. There aren’t a lot of medical supplies left, but there’s more here than what he has on him, and that’s good.

He has to guide Vinnie to a bed and force him down; he shuts the door to the ward afterwards and locks it, fairly convinced that Vinnie won’t be able to jimmy it on his own. Then he chooses a bed - close to the windows so he can see. It’s the bed Liam would’ve chosen.

_He has to be okay_ , Brett thinks. _Tomorrow. Tomorrow I’m gonna go look._

~*~

When he wakes in the morning, it’s because the sun is up.

He rolls over, slides his hand across the mattress to touch Liam - like he’s done every morning almost since they started sharing a bed. His hand comes up empty; Brett sits up quickly.

Hospital. Right. Brett looks around; he’s starting to remember everything, even as he has a hard time shaking the dream off. Liam’s not here.

Liam’s not here. The knowledge sinks into him like ice. Liam’s not here. Which means Liam spent last night out on the streets - if he’s even alive.

He banishes that thought immediately. He has to believe Liam’s alive, or he’s going to fucking lose it, and that would make three of them almost totally useless. That’s not what Liam went out there for. He did it to give them a chance, and Brett’s not going to waste it panicking when Owen and Vinnie need his help.

He slides out of bed, taking a deep, trembling breath; there are tears pricking his eyes already. He’s tired. His muscles ache from carrying Owen. His heart aches worse with the knowledge that Liam’s alone out there. Brett might be stuck in a shitty situation, but if Liam was here… Brett would at least know he was okay.

He heads over to Owen; the guy opens his eyes the moment Brett approaches him. He’s alert; that’s good.

“Hey,” Brett says softly. “How’re you doing?”

“Like shit,” Owen says, and Brett has to smile a little at how much like Liam Owen sounds.

“Yeah. Gunshot wounds are nasty. Let me see.”

Owen’s leg isn’t infected, which is something Brett can at least be grateful for - if he never has to see an infected wound again in his life, it’ll be too soon.

“Can you move it much?” Brett asks.

“Not a lot,” Owen says, even as he tries to and winces. “Not enough to walk or nothin’.”

_Anything_ , Brett corrects silently.

“No sign of Liam?” Owen asks.

Brett closes his eyes. “No,” he murmurs. “Nothing.”

Owen’s quiet for a moment. “He’s smart,” he says. “Not book smart like you and Vin are. But he knows shit about hiding and killing. He’ll be okay. Seems like he likes you. Bet he’ll fight like hell to get here.”

“He doesn’t even know we’re here,” Brett says.

“So? He’ll work it out. Or we’ll find him.”

Brett looks outside. The sun is already high in the sky; the room is getting warmer and warmer by the minute.

_Heatstroke. Injury. Dehydration. Panic attack. Dissociation_. Brett’s brain has apparently decided to list the things that may be preventing Liam from getting back to them. _Being bitten. Being captured. Being…_

He swallows. Liam’s out there with dozens of Keepers. He might be fast, and he might be smart, but faced up against a horde of walkers and potentially a small force of Keepers, even Liam’s going to get caught eventually. He can’t keep moving forever - and once he’s tired enough, one or the other will inevitably catch up to him and-

“He’s fine,” Owen says.

“He might not be,” Brett snaps. “Every time we get separated something goes to hell.”

“You said it yourself yesterday, man,” Owen says. “He’s not a kid. Can’t protect him forever.”

“I don’t protect him because I think he’s a kid or because I think he’s incapable,” Brett replies exasperatedly. “I protect him because I love him, and that’s never going to change.”

Owen arches an eyebrow. “So that’s why you stayed?” he asks.

“What?”

“That why you stayed with him? When he found you in Ashburton? He would’ve been seventeen, right? Looked younger, probably, too, and I’m pretty fuckin’ sure he wouldn’t have straight-up told you anything about himself.”

“He didn’t, what’s your point?”

“Well, you didn’t love him then,” Owen says. “He was probably a total pain in the ass. But you stayed anyway, right?”

“Well yeah - the weather, and he was trying to find me a way out-”

“But after that?” Owen asks. “You could’ve gone anytime. So why didn’t you? You said you had friends and family you were looking for, but you stayed with him even though he’s basically just a fucking kid who had to grow up too fast. Why?”

Brett hesitates. He thinks back - how even after their first meeting, when Liam escorted him out to the tunnel, he felt bad about leaving him - how uncomfortable it made him feel to know that Liam was going to be alone again once he left, with no respite in the foreseeable future.

“It felt wrong,” Brett says. “It felt wrong to leave him. Especially after he’d helped me. He didn’t have to.”

Owen nods. “Yeah. Okay. So how’d he nearly get raped?”

Brett’s neck stiffens abruptly; he wasn’t expecting Owen to even remember he’d said that, let alone bring it up. “I didn’t-”

“You said the Keepers nearly got him,” Owen says. “Why weren’t you protecting him?”

Anger flares in the pit of Brett’s stomach, then up his throat; he has to take a moment to let the ringing of his ears die out. “I was sick,” he says, his voice as calm as he can make it. “With that aggressive pneumonia. I was running out of medicine. Liam went to find me some. Ran into a Keeper. That’s when it happened.”

Owen closes his eyes - almost like the answer isn’t good enough.

“Do you think I don’t think about it?” Brett demands. “Do you think it never once crossed my mind that I wasn’t fucking there for him? That he was nearly raped and slaughtered and I wasn’t there to protect him? Because seriously - I think about it every fucking day, Owen. I think about what could’ve happened to him every day.”

“So what did you do?” Owen snaps. “Nothing?”

“That Keeper died before I got a shot at him,” Brett says. “But his friend? His friend caught me and Liam busted me out - that was when he got stabbed. I tied him up. When Liam was out of the woods I went back. I wanted to kill him but I didn’t. I let him slowly starve and sit in his own piss and shit and I didn’t feel a fucking thing. I wanted him to suffer. And you know what? I’m not proud of it - but give me a chance, and I’d do it again. What happened to him _wasn’t fair_. He wasn’t hurting anyone. He’d never hurt anyone. And he nearly lost his life because I got a fucking cold and then ended up as live bait for him. You don’t need to punish me with disapproval or whatever else it is you’re doing - I’ve been doing that since it happened. I’ll never forgive myself for it.”

There’s a long pause. Owen stares at him; Brett rebandages his leg. His hands are shaking; his eyes are a little blurry. He wants to scream. He wants Liam back. Right now - as of yesterday, the moment the warehouse door closed between them.

“You should,” Owen says.

“What?” Brett mutters.

“You should forgive yourself,” Owen says softly. “It wasn’t your fault. He doesn’t blame you. That’s pretty damn obvious. And… I don’t either. Not really. What they did and tried to do… how you reacted to it…”

“I know,” Brett says. “I’m a monster.”

Owen shakes his head. “I would’ve done the same thing to 'em,” he says. “There ain’t no comin’ back from that. From doing that. To anyone, 'specially a kid.”

Brett nods. He actually does feel better knowing that Owen would react the same way.

“Listen,” Owen says. “Li’s like a little brother to me, dude. Last I knew he was this crazy-timid kid with no survival skills and he needed to be protected. From everything. I keep forgettin’ he’s not a kid now. That he can make choices.”

Brett nods.

“Doesn’t mean I trust you with him,” Owen says. “But you stuck with him. And that’s more than most people woulda done in that situation. And he says he loves you. Doesn’t mean it in a "no homo” way either.“

Brett snorts. "Yeah. He really doesn’t mean it in a "no homo” way.“

Owen smiles a little. "So we’re cool?”

“If by cool you mean we’re both vowing to protect him from anything and anyone that might try to fuck with him, then yeah. We’re cool.”

Owen holds up a fist; Brett bumps it, smiling a little.

“How’s Vin?” Owen asks.

Brett turns; Vinnie’s asleep still by the looks of it. “Okay,” he says. “Look, dude, who’s Lex?”

Owen looks suddenly uncomfortable. “Just a girl,” he says.

“Oh, c'mon, it’s never just a girl,” Brett says, irritated. “You don’t wander into zombie territory for "just a girl”, so spill.“

"Look, dude,” Owen says, “it’s a lot more complicated than you-”

There’s a crash somewhere below them that sounds like shattering glass; Vinnie sits up, and Brett’s spine breaks out into a damp, cold sweat. It could be a zombie or a wild animal; it could also be the Keepers.

“Wait here,” he says softly, picking up Liam’s shotgun and heading out into the hallway.

“Careful,” Vinnie says vaguely.

Brett nods as he steps out, then shuts the door behind him. His heart’s pounding as he begins down the hallway - some of the windows are boarded up, and the lighting is dim. He doesn’t have full vision.

Vision. His stomach churns. Liam’s vision isn’t that great at night or when he’s reading; Brett hopes he has his glasses.

He hears footsteps on the stairwell and stops, his breath caught halfway up his windpipe. He settles back against the wall, behind a filing cabinet, and waits, straining his hearing. From here, if he has to, he can fall back, or…

The stairwell door opens; he hears footsteps. Two sets, in fact - one begins to sound fainter as the person moves away, but the other person is coming closer, slowly.

That’s when Brett looks across the hall and sees the reflection of someone in the windows to the exam rooms on the other side; it’s a girl, young, with long hair and wide, frightened eyes. She’s so thin it’s startling to witness - she must be hungry.

Hungry and scared, Brett thinks. Not a good combination. Especially if she’s not alone, which…

She keeps advancing; she’s getting closer and closer to the room Owen and Vinnie are in, and Brett’s all that stands between her and them. They can’t fight; it’s gonna have to be him.

He steps out from behind the cabinet, shotgun raised to his eye - he never really learned how to hold it properly - and watches as she turns, sees him, and jumps about a foot in the air.

“That’s close enough,” he says, trying to effect the growl and glare that Liam adopts when he’s trying to be intimidating.

She swallows, holds her hands up, and begins to back up. Brett closes the gap, not missing the way the fear in her eyes turns into downright terror. He almost feels bad until he remembers she’s probably with the Keepers.

“Alright,” he says. “How’d you find me here?”

She swallows again; he can see her chest rising and falling rapidly, her collarbones protruding with the movement. “I - I-”

He cocks the gun higher. “How’d you find me here?” he snarls. “How’d you know?” He’s advancing on her quickly, and she’s backtracking - she keeps looking over her shoulder, almost desperately. Waiting for the other person to show up, probably. Given how thin she is, she’s probably bait for something.

“Hey,” he growls. “I asked you a-”

“Liam!”

He stops in his tracks; she’s calling desperately, but with confidence; she’s not guessing. She knows. She knows Liam’s name and God, that can only mean bad things-

“Where is he?” Brett says, striding forward. “What’d you do to him?”

“Liam!” she shouts. “Liam!”

Brett doesn’t see how she could’ve possibly forced Liam to submit to her, unless-

Unless Liam’s really badly hurt and has no choice, which is a possibility far too within the realms of realism for Brett’s comfort, or she’s with other people, who are out of sight, who might be holding Liam hostage-

He hears panting, and then Fudge rounds the corner, ears forward and tongue out, totally unhurt. Brett’s stomach lurches; Liam’s dog is here, which means Liam must be here, somewhere, and he’s probably not being coerced or forced; he’s probably somewhere else, looking for Brett-

“Where is he?” he asks - and it’s not out of aggression anymore, either. He’s desperate. She knows something, and Brett needs to know what that is.

“He’s looking for you,” she says shakily, taking another step back. “Can you stop pointing that thing at me?”

Fudge barks and races towards him; Brett kneels down to stroke his fur, surprised at just how happy he is to see him. Fudge licks his face and neck enthusiastically.

“Hayden?” a voice asks. “What’s-”

Brett looks up. Liam’s standing at the end of the hallway, staring at him, seemingly dumbstruck.

“Liam,” he breathes, standing up and hurrying forwards. “Oh my God, you’re alive.”

Liam meets him halfway; he straight-up runs to Brett, leaving his things on the ground, and almost throws himself forward - he’s got an arm around Brett’s shoulders, the other around his waist, and Brett’s whole body seems to sigh with relief, like it recognises that Liam’s returned to him safely.

Brett holds him for a moment; savours Liam’s scent, even though it’s sharp with sweat, and the warmth of his body.

_Gotta check he’s okay_ , he realises suddenly, and he pulls back, holds Liam’s face in his hands; Liam’s own hands come to rest on his wrists, holding tightly. He stares straight into Brett’s eyes - and Liam hardly ever makes eye contact like this, even now - and Brett sees them flickering to take Brett in. He’s reflected in Liam’s pupils, which are wide in the semi-darkness of the hospital.

“Liam,” he whispers, and Liam stumbles up onto his toes and catches him in a kiss; Brett leans down so he doesn’t have to strain, holds Liam’s neck, kisses back softly, revelling in the information that Liam’s alive; that he’s okay, that he somehow made it out of the shitstorm they left behind.

Liam separates from him; their foreheads press together. “I love you,” he whispers to Brett.

Brett feels almost the same way he did the first time Liam said it - like someone’s cracked his chest open and injected straight-up liquid love right into his heart. “I love you too,” he murmurs back, pulling Liam close. He gets his hand around the back of Liam’s head - there’s blood crusted into his hair, but Brett can check later, because Liam’s fine right now.

He opens his eyes briefly; the girl he pointed the gun at is standing still, exactly where she was before, except she’s smiling and she looks like she might even be crying.

“I thought the Keepers were going to get you,” Liam whispers into his shoulder. “Or the herd. I thought…”

“I’m still here. I’m okay.” He pulls back. “Are you okay?” he asks - because he didn’t really check properly.

Liam smiles faintly. “I am now.”

He must’ve taken a hit, somewhere, because there’s bruising smattered down the side of his face - along with a patchy helping of dark, dried blood. If Brett looks closely enough, he can see bruising on Liam’s shoulder, too, where his shirt sags a little bit - on his arm.

“I’ll get you fixed up,” he promises, and Liam’s face melts in relief. “Are you hurt badly?”

“Not badly. Just - some bruises and cuts.” He shakes himself suddenly. “Shit, um - don’t shoot her, okay? This is Hayden.” He steps back to look at her. “She helped me find you.”

Hayden’s skinny, shaking a little, and sunburnt - they both are, upon closer inspection - and she smiles hesitantly at Brett, like she wants to trust him. Brett knows Liam’s probably told her nothing but good things about him… but he did just point a gun at her.

“Sorry about the gun,” he says sheepishly. “I didn’t know. If I had-”

“It’s okay,” she says quickly.

“She helped me find you guys,” Liam explains. He’s still panting softly - so is Hayden, now that Brett’s listening, and he realises they both probably have the beginnings of heat exhaustion. “Look, um, she - she was with Theo, but-”

“Liam?” Brett questions softly. He doesn’t want to lose it - because Liam wouldn’t be with her unless he trusted her - but Theo? And Theo’s here? With the Keepers?

“Let me finish,” Liam pleads. “She was with Theo, but - I ran into her while they were chasing me and she let me go, and then she let me go again when they caught up to me, and then she found the warehouse to warn us. And I took her chip out and everything, and-”

“It’s okay,” Brett interrupts; Liam’s run off his feet, by the looks of it - and sounds of it. He’s looking up at Brett imploringly - the same way he did when he found Fudge, almost. And Hayden - she looks scared, but determined, too. Like she’s ready to fight for her right to be here.

“Owen and Vinnie-” Liam starts.

“We won’t tell them,” Brett says. “Do you trust her?”

“Yes,” Liam says instantly. “Yeah. I do.”

“Why?” Brett asks.

Liam pauses for a moment. “She…” he starts, hesitates, licks his lips, and tries again - Brett thinks maybe he should’ve left it until Liam’s a little more coherent. “She had the upper hand right from the beginning,” Liam admits. “She watched us all the way from Walmart to the warehouse. She knew there were four of us and that one was injured. She could’ve easily lead Theo back to you, but she didn’t. And - when Theo and the rest of them caught up to me, I hid under a car. She lied to Theo’s face that I wasn’t there, sent him in completely the wrong direction. Even though he’s withholding their food unless they…”

Liam trails off. Looks at Hayden, who’s staring resolutely at the wall, and then back at Brett.

Brett knows that expression; that’s the look of someone who’s trying desperately to forget and ignore something terrible that’s happened to them. And, judging by Liam’s open, pleading expression, Brett knows exactly what that thing is.

“If you make her go, they’ll kill her,” Liam says quietly.

“I’m not making her go anywhere,” Brett says. “Hayden - just don’t tell the other two, okay? Just don’t tell them. You’re okay with us.”

She almost sags with relief. “Thank you,” she says. “I won’t - I’m not with Theo anymore.”

Brett smiles. “That’s good. Besides, I can’t throw you out. You helped Liam. I owe you.”

“You aren’t bad guys,” she replies.

_We might not be_ , Brett thinks as he leads them back. _Owen and Vinnie… I’m not so sure._

~*~

“We’ve been here a while,” Brett says. “We had to leave the warehouse. There were walkers-”

Liam nods. “I backtracked,” he says. “I saw them. I figured you guys had to have moved.”

“You - you went back there? When?”

“Sometime around midday.”

Brett reels. “We just missed you,” he says. “Liam, I’m sorry, we-”

“It’s okay,” Liam says quickly; he’s walking fast to keep up with Brett’s long strides. “I get it. I know why you had to. Don’t worry, okay? I’m here now anyway.”

_And worse for wear_ , Brett thinks, but he says nothing as he pushes open the door to the hospital room.

“Brett,” Owen says; he’s sitting up on his elbows. “What-”

“Look who I found,” Brett says, smiling as Liam and Hayden enter.

Owen’s face splits into a grin. “Li-Li!”

“Don’t call me that,” Liam says, but he’s smiling too as he enters and leans down to bump Owen’s fist. “How’s your leg?”

Owen gestures. “Turns out your squeeze is a great doc.”

Liam winces. “Jesus, Owen, don’t call him that. You sound like a fucking grandma.” He looks up, sees Vinnie. “Hi, Vinnie.”

Vinnie smiles vaguely, but doesn’t say anything. Liam turns to Brett, who shakes his head; there’s no point trying to get the guy to talk. Something is clearly very, very wrong with him, and Brett hasn’t had a chance to figure out what yet. Better not to poke him until they know what’ll happen when their poking works.

After a brief round of introductions, they all sit down. The longer they are, the more and more Brett’s realising that Liam’s exhausted - he’s blinking rapidly, and his breathing is shallow. Brett knows that the longer Liam goes like this, the more and more likely he is to dissociate. It’s always worse when he’s exhausted.

Brett sets his teeth. He checks out Hayden, quickly - Liam took her chip out, and Brett’s not sure what surprises him more; that he volunteered to do it, or that he managed without fainting. Maybe Liam’s got a little more to him than even Brett thought.

After that, he moves onto Liam. The first thing he really notices is the dried blood on Liam’s face, in his hair; he gets a bowl, some water, and a rag, and settles in front of Liam quietly. Hayden’s not watching them - or she’s at least pretending not to watch them - but Vinnie and Owen are.

He feels a lick of irritation; have they seriously never seen two men be affectionate, or kiss, or be in a relationship? Maybe they haven’t. Still, Brett thought he and Owen were at least on the same page where Liam was concerned.

“I wanna check your head,” he says to Liam softly.

Liam nods, watching him, and leans his head forward when Brett comes close with the damp cloth. He’s careful as he cleans the blood away - it’s on Liam’s neck, and the side of his face and jaw, running down his temple.

_He needs a shower, not a sponge bath_ , Brett realises. But still - he needs to check this head wound isn’t serious.

Liam’s hand jerks upwards when Brett runs his hands and fingers gently over Liam’s scalp. “Ow,” he mutters, but he doesn’t sound particularly reproachful.

“Here?” Brett asks, applying the tiniest bit of pressure.

Liam reaches up and guides his hand. “Here,” he says with a wince.

Brett nods, leans closer, and parts Liam’s hair - it’s thick and matted with blood, nowhere near its usual soft texture, and he has to be gentle - he doesn’t want to reopen the wound, the fragile scab over the top, and cause it to bleed again.

“Hmm,” he murmurs, peering at it. “Took a knock, huh?”

Liam nods a bit.

“Headache?”

“Yeah. Not sure if it’s from hitting my head or because I’m tired.”

“Maybe both.” Brett leans back. “Can I take a look at the rest of you?” he asks.

Liam shuffles around on his seat. Brett takes his hand first; he noticed the bandage around it, and now that he’s looking closer, it’s far too neat and professional for Liam to have done himself.

“What happened here?” he asks, unwinding the bandage. “Jesus.”

Liam winces a little as Brett tilts his palm, staring at the large cut across it. “I just - grabbed a bit of shrapnel accidentally,” he says. “Hayden stitched it up.”

Brett looks at her. “These are really neat stitches,” he comments.

She blushes a bit. “I learned pretty fast when it all went bad.”

“Yeah. Think we all did, or we died.” Brett changes the bandages, but he doesn’t need to do anything else to the cut; still, Liam doesn’t really seem any better off now. He cuts a look at Owen and Vinnie, adjusts where he’s sitting, and winces a little.

“Come to the bathroom,” Brett says decisively, and Liam stands up - Brett’s alarmed when he wobbles. “You okay?”

“Mhm,” Liam says softly. He follows Brett into the bathroom - he’s got a noticeable limp, and once Brett closes the door, Liam sinks down on the edge of the tub.

Brett crouches in front of him. “What’s going on?” he asks quietly.

Liam looks away from him; he clearly doesn’t want to say.

“Just me,” Brett says.

“You’re gonna freak.”

“I won’t freak. What happened?”

Liam shifts, winces. “I fell off a balcony.”

Brett’s jaw drops. “You what?” he demands.

“And there’s the freaking,” Liam jokes weakly. “I was hiding from the Keepers - I hung off a balcony for a little while, I was gonna pull myself back up but I - I couldn’t, and my hand.” He holds it up - the bandaged one. “It slipped because of the blood.”

“How far did you fall?” Brett breathes.

“Fifteen feet,” Liam says.

His head swims. “Shirt off,” he says shakily. “Let me look. Is anything broken?”

“I don’t think so - ow.”

Brett succeeds in getting Liam’s shirt off him - and he stops breathing. Liam’s entire left side is covered in bruises and swelling, some of it so tight and painful it looks like it might begin to bleed if Brett touches it. It’s all over him - his back, his side - even his hip is bruised, and the angry swathe of colour extends into the waistband of his jeans, beyond sight.

“Oh my God,” Brett whispers, and his voice breaks. “Liam…”

“It’s just bruising,” Liam says softly.

It might be, but Brett’s never seen Liam look physically worse than this. It’s shocking, to realise that the seemingly superficial bruising on Liam’s face is only the tip of the iceberg where his injuries are concerned; that Liam walked like this for two whole days just to find him.

“What feels the worst?” Brett asks shakily, taking it all in.

“My hip and leg.” Liam looks worried. “Brett, I - it hurts to walk, I think I’ve really fucked it up.”

“Let me see,” Brett murmurs. “You probably need a shower anyway, so - I’ll help you. Can you stand up?”

“Yeah. I’m kind of unsteady.”

“That’s okay, I’ve got you.” Brett stands, letting Liam hold onto him; he unbuckles Liam’s belt and slides his jeans down, carefully, over the bruising.

He can see now why it’s painful; Liam’s hipbones are pretty sharp, and the left seems to have taken the brunt of the fall, along with his shoulder. There’s heavy bruising on his upper thigh, too, which is probably what’s causing him pain.

“Here,” Brett murmurs, touching Liam’s hip gingerly. “This is why it’s hurting. Once the swelling goes down… well, you’re probably bruised all the way down to your bone here. But you should be okay. I’ll get you some painkillers though, just to alleviate the pain a bit.”

“But it all looks okay?” Liam asks worriedly.

“Well. You look pretty busted. But nothing’s broken, or you wouldn’t be walking.”

Liam nods. “Will you stay while I shower?”

Brett smiles, starts stripping down. “I need one too you know.”

When they hop under the spray, it’s blessedly cool; for a minute or so, the water and soap suds running off Liam’s body are varying shades of brown and red from the blood, but the water runs clear soon enough, and Liam even looks like he’s relaxing somewhat.

“The hospital beds are narrow,” Brett says softly. “But we can share one if you want.”

“Yes,” Liam breathes. “Please.”

Brett nods; he doesn’t want to be away from Liam either, especially when, by Liam’s own admission, he’s feeling unsteady on his feet and is in pain. Now that Liam’s back, he can at least keep him safe. Or try to. Maybe even keep him off his feet somehow, let his leg rest - Brett’s pretty confident it is just the bruising, but if there’s some damage to the bones…

If there’s damage to the bones, Brett doesn’t give a fuck about getting to DC; if Liam’s seriously hurt or even potentially slightly disabled from this, they’re going back to River’s End. The rest of the world can go fuck itself.

Disabled. Brett shivers a little, looks down at Liam; he’s scrubbing his head gingerly, wincing as soap gets into the cut that caused all the bleeding. If Liam was physically disabled, in the middle of a zombie apocalypse, with no access to adequate health care and medicine, then…

_Then we’d go back to River’s End and we’d just stay there_ , Brett thinks. _But you’re working yourself up over nothing, because he’s fine._

He helps Liam step out and then dry off - he’s about to get him cleaner clothes when Liam speaks.

“Shit,” Liam says suddenly. “I forgot to tell you. I brought the car closer. It’s near the warehouse. If we need stuff for Owen, we can go get it.”

Brett weighs it. “Maybe later,” he says softly. “He’s stable right now. I don’t want you out there.”

Liam huffs, but he doesn’t disagree. He’s not moving very well at all - he seems to mostly be relying on Brett to get him up and down, and he pretty much lets Brett puts jeans on him. He manages to struggle into a shirt of Brett’s on his own, though.

“God,” Brett chuckles. “You’re drowning in that, Li.”

“It’s comfy, though,” Liam says with a small smile. “Doesn’t hurt to wear or anything.”

“That’s good. Hungry?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay. We’ve got food.” Brett straightens up a little; Liam stays sitting on the edge of the bathtub. “Do you need some help?” Brett asks softly.

Liam smiles wanly and reaches up with both hands; Brett takes his weight and pulls him to his feet, not missing the way Liam winces and stumbles a little.

“Yeah,” Brett murmurs. “I’ll get you those pain pills. See if we can take the edge off.”

They head back out into the hospital room; Owen is sleeping fitfully, Vinnie is sitting next to him - kind of just looking around - and Hayden is smiling widely; Fudge is rolled onto his back at her feet, tail wagging slowly as she rubs his belly.

“He’s a slut for affection,” Liam says, and she laughs.

“He’s cute. I love him.”

“He loves you too.”

Brett smiles a little; they seem to get along well, and that’s nice to see, considering Liam probably hasn’t had friends his own age in years. Plus, Hayden doesn’t seem all that concerned about their relationship status, either.

He watches for a moment; Liam sits down kind of close to her, and Hayden doesn’t move. Somehow - despite Liam’s general distrust of people and Hayden’s fiery personality - they seemed to have forged a fragile, but sweet friendship. He sees her turn a little, glance at Liam - her eyes slide calculatingly over Liam’s injured side, lingering on his head and hip, and then she gives a short nod to herself.

In another life, Brett would probably be feeling threatened. There’s no need now, though; Hayden’s clearly just assessing Liam’s health, which must mean she knows how badly hurt he is. Besides, Brett’s kind of happy that someone else will obsessively worry about his accident-prone boyfriend along with him.

“Oh, fuck,” Liam says, and everyone turns to him; he looks sheepish. “Sorry. Just - I remembered I have jellybeans.”

Brett feels his brain start to melt as it desperately tries to make the jump between what Liam said and what’s actually possible. He blinks.

“I’m serious,” Liam says into the silence. “Uh, where’s my-”

Hayden pulls it closer and nudges it to him. “Thanks,” Liam says, and unzips it. “See? Oh, man, Fudge - I found your bone.”

Fudge shuffles forward - the dog is smart enough to have worked out the difference between “sit” and “stay”, and that means that he’ll creep forward when people have food - because he is technically sitting still. It’s kind of sad to watch a ninety pound German Shepherd be so pathetic.

Liam produces half a rawhide bone and hands it to Fudge; Fudge takes it gently, puts it down, looks at it, and then puts his paws up on Liam’s knees.

“You ate the other half, stupid,” Liam says fondly, stroking Fudge’s ears. “Short memory, huh?”

Fudge whines, and Liam nods like the noise makes perfect sense to him. Brett smiles. He’s glad Liam’s alright -but he’s also really happy Fudge is alright, even if he competes with Brett for Liam’s affection. If something happened to Fudge, Liam would be wrecked.

“Brett,” he says, holding out a bag.

“Jesus.” Liam wasn’t kidding about the jellybeans; the bag is huge, and by the looks of it, Liam’s got more. “Where did you-”

“I went to a Rite-Aid to patch myself up.” Liam sighs. “Sort of a long story.”

“Don’t have anywhere else to be,” Owen rasps from his bed. Liam jumps about a foot in the air - evidently having forgotten Owen is even present. Or Vinnie, but Vinnie hasn’t spoken since Liam got back.

So Liam explains what happened to everyone present. He omits pieces - says that he stumbled across Hayden and felt sorry for her - but cuts Brett a glance that tells Brett he’ll find out eventually.

Brett doesn’t mind. Right now, he’s totally stuck on the amount of times Liam was nearly found, shot, killed, or in danger. It’s a fucking miracle he even made it back alive.

As Liam finishes up - with some help from Hayden - Brett finds some of their pain medication, the stronger stuff, that won’t make Liam sick. The last thing Liam needs on top of a head wound and extensive bruising is to be puking.

“Here,” he murmurs.

Liam takes the pills from him and downs them with some water. Within five minutes, Brett notices that Liam’s eyes are beginning to close; he’s starting to lean against Hayden.

“I’ll take first watch,” she says quickly.

Brett smiles. “Thanks. Come on, Li. Get some sleep.”

“Not tired,” Liam yawns, but he stands up and lets Brett help him up onto a bed. Within a few moments, his eyes are closed, and he’s breathing deeply.

Brett turns to look at Hayden. She’s staring into the fire; as he watches, she heaves a small sigh and wraps her arms around her knees tightly. She’s shivering, even being as close to the fire as she is.

Brett grabs one of his hoodies and goes to sit next to her; she jumps, but relaxes when she sees it’s just him, and takes the hoodie when he holds it out to her. “Thanks,” she murmurs.

“No problem.”

Hayden twists a little. “How’s Liam?”

“He’ll be alright. Pain pills knock him around a little. Nothing to worry about.”

“And the bruises-”

“Nothing’s broken.” Brett chews his lip a little - a habit he definitely picked up from Liam. “He’s pretty sore. Will be for a while. But he should be back up on his feet pretty soon.” He looks at her properly. “How about you? Are you alright?”

She nods quickly.

“If there’s anything wrong,” Brett murmurs, “let me know, okay? Where we come from - I trained with a doctor. I know a little. Not nearly enough, but…”

“Enough to help,” Hayden says. “Liam told me you saved his life when he was stabbed.”

Brett closes his eyes. “He got stabbed because of me,” he murmurs unhappily. “I got into trouble. Liam followed me, because that’s what he does, and he got into a fight getting me free. He needed surgery to fix the damage done to his chest wall.”

“He seems okay now.”

“Yeah. Now. Spent a whole month getting him even remotely healthy - healthy enough to move, to leave, and even then, even after that, we had to travel and he was exhausted and looked sick all the time. I thought the travelling was gonna kill him at one point.”

Hayden nods. “That must have been scary,” she says softly.

Brett swallows. He remembers Blackcliffe; once they settled, getting Liam to move or be productive in any sense was near impossible, and Liam had spent a lot of his time sleeping - twelve, sometimes up to fourteen hours a night. Brett had known it wasn’t normal at the time, but he didn’t know how abnormal it was until Liam recovered a little better and started sleeping seven or eight hours.

“It was,” he says, shaking his head a little. “God, I swear, ever since we met… one of us has almost always been sick or hurt in one way, shape, or form. Concussion. Pneumonia. Hypothermia. Infection. Coma. It never fucking ends, you know? I just…”

Hayden’s looking at him sympathetically.

“I just want to find us somewhere safe so we can settle down and be okay,” Brett says, distressed. “I’m so sick of worrying about him and knowing that he sticks his neck out for me and that I’m the reason he gets hurt half the time. I don’t want to have to worry about him obsessively and I don’t want to be the catalyst for him getting injured.”

“But how many times have you been hurt?” Hayden asks. “It sounds fifty-fifty-”

“It isn’t,” Brett says softly. “The last time I was in serious trouble, it was totally my own fault and Liam had nothing to do with it. I’ve never been injured because I needed to risk my life for him.”

Hayden’s quiet for a moment. Then, “If he loves you as much as he sounds like he does, he probably never wants you to have to do that.”

Brett takes a moment to think about that, really think about it. It wouldn’t make them even, really, and Liam would feel awful if Brett was hurt because of him. It wouldn’t be like gaining the upper hand in a round of cards.

“Yeah,” he says. “You’re right.”

She smiles a little. “I’m gonna make some traps,” she says. “We can sleep if I do.”

“Traps?”

“Yeah. Noise traps. I’ll show you.”

They don’t take long to make - Fudge follows them tiredly, sniffing around but staying out of their way as they string together cans and bottles and tie them between doorways. Eventually, the whole ward is sealed off somehow.

Hayden plucks one of the strings. “There,” she says. “Safe. For now anyway.”

He nods. It’s too dark to be able to see anything - if someone comes in here, undead or otherwise, they’ll walk straight through. “This is good,” he says.

They head back to the ward - none of the others have stirred. Hayden takes up a bed while Brett checks on Owen.

The guy’s pale. Shaking. He’s obviously not good, but Brett isn’t sure what to do for him without their medical supplies. What he really needs is antiseptic, materials for an IV, saline solution…

Fudge whines at him, tugs on his sleeve with his teeth. He’s trying to drag Brett to Liam’s bed.

“You’re kind of a nervous dog, you know that?” Brett whispers as he finally caves and heads over to the bed Liam’s sleeping on. “Like, really nervous.”

Fudge huffs, puts his head on the bed, and sniffs eagerly at Liam for a moment before lying down on the floor next to him. Checking he’s okay, probably - Fudge started doing that when Liam started having nightmares back in River’s End.

Liam shifts when Brett finally slides under the blankets. “Brett,” he murmurs.

“Hey,” Brett whispers softly. “I thought those pain pills knocked you out.”

“They did for a while.”

Brett rubs Liam’s chest and belly gently; the motion is usually soothing for him, and Liam yawns a little, tucks himself slightly closer. He doesn’t flinch, which means he’s probably still feeling the effects of the pain pills.

“Brett?”

Brett rolls onto his side to look at Liam; Liam’s fidgeting, seems kind of worried. The sound of the others breathing around them is the only one for a moment, until Liam finally speaks.

“Are you… are you mad at me?”

“What?” Brett asks, honestly surprised - and trying to think back to any moment that could have given Liam cause to think that. “No, of course not. Why?”

“I just, um…” Liam shrugs. “I was worried you were. Because I trusted Owen and Vinnie and I really shouldn’t have. I kind of let you down.”

“Liam,” Brett murmurs. “I’m not mad at you for that. You… they were your friends before. I get it. If my friends turned up right now I’d do exactly the same thing. I don’t blame you for that. We’re all okay.”

Liam nods. “I’m sorry, though,” he whispers, moving a little closer with a wince. “It kind of got everything fucked up and usually - usually I’m okay with instincts. I won’t do it again.”

“Shh,” Brett murmurs, then moves forward to kiss him softly. “It’s okay. Nothing to forgive, alright?” He turns to look over his shoulder; Owen and Vinnie are both snoring, dead to the world. “But we need to talk soon. Not here.”

Liam nods. “Is everything okay?” he asks.

“For now.” Brett reaches out to touch Liam’s face, then slides his hand up into Liam’s hair. “I’m so glad you’re okay,” he says softly. “If something had happened to you, Liam…”

“But it didn’t.”

Brett tries to smile. It kind of did; he fell off a balcony, for fuck’s sake. But here he is, pretending he’s not in pain for Brett’s sake and shutting his eyes as Brett strokes his hair - the longer parts at the top, which are soft and fluffy from his shower earlier.

“You have great hair,” Brett says.

Liam smiles sleepily. “Nah.”

“Yeah. You do.” Brett strokes it again. “You’re all floofy.”

“I’m not fucking floofy,” Liam mumbles, trying to bat his hand away and failing miserably. “What’s floofy anyway?”

“It’s so fluffy it basically floats,” Brett whispers.

Liam’s mouth twitches in a smile, but his eyes are closed, and Brett watches as he relaxes into sleep. He lies like that for a while, really, watching Liam breathe - this time last night, the space next to him in the bed was empty, and he was convinced Liam was dead, or at least badly hurt.

He falls asleep. He’s grateful for the traps Hayden set up - it was going to be a long night otherwise, and now they can rest properly.

He wakes up sometime later, confused to find that it’s still dark. He hasn’t slept much; he can tell by the way he struggles to drag himself into consciousness. He wonders why he’s awake for a moment, doesn’t know where he is - until the bed shudders a little, and there’s a sharp inhalation of breath nearby.

Liam, he realises, forcing his eyes open. He hears Liam groan, turn, stiffen, and then slowly relax, emitting another quiet noise.

He rolls over; Liam’s rolled onto his back, his face scrunched up in obvious discomfort. “Hey,” Brett murmurs. “You okay?”

“Hurts to fucking lie down,” Liam replies, his voice croaky with exhaustion. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you up. I’ll get on another bed-”

“No,” Brett whispers. “No, stay. I won’t sleep any better if you’re gone. Can I help you somehow?”

Liam turns his head, opens his eyes; the moon’s shining brightly through the large windows, and Brett can see him smiling. “I don’t think so. Thanks, though. For offering.”

Brett nods. “Let me know if there is,” he replies softly.

Liam nods, settles, but there’s a wince of pain etched into his face, and… well, Brett can’t leave him like that. The pain pills must have worn off, at least enough that Liam woke up - either because he’s generally in pain, or because he moved the wrong way while sleeping.

“Try, um…” He grabs a few pillows from another bed. “Roll onto your stomach and lie on these. Should take the pressure off your bad side totally.”

Liam rolls a little, settles with a sigh and a pillow stuffed between his legs. “Mm. That’s much better. Thanks.”

“No problem.” Brett pulls the covers up over both of them, rests his hand gingerly on Liam’s hip. “This okay?”

“Yeah,” Liam sighs sleepily.

“Good. Get some sleep, okay?”

“Okay.”

~*~

When he wakes the next morning, Liam’s still crashed out, dead to the world.

Brett sits up a little bit, relieved to wake up with Liam next to him. Yesterday morning was hell - not knowing where Liam was, if he was okay or even alive…

He shivers, pulls the blanket back a little. It’s a heavy waffle one, standard hospital issue, and Liam barely stirs as Brett pulls it back, then rucks up his shirt around his chest.

He nods to himself. Liam’s pretty severely bruised - but in the daylight, he can see that that’s all it is, that it even looks a little better today in the places it wasn’t as heavily impacted. His shoulder and hip still look terrible - but Brett’s hoping they come down tomorrow too.

He tugs Liam’s shirt back down, replaces the blanket, and slides out of bed carefully, deciding to let Liam sleep a while longer.

“Is he okay?”

He looks up. Hayden’s sitting on the edge of her bed, her feet on the railing, arms wrapped around her knees.

“Yeah,” Brett says with a small smile. “Yeah, he’s gonna be fine. He’s just being lazy and oversleeping, as usual.”

She nods. “I stayed,” she says quietly.

“Sorry?”

“I, um.” She winces. “I heard him fall off the balcony. I found him there. I wanted to get close and help him, but Fudge wouldn’t let me. I stayed until he woke up and kept moving.”

“Thank you,” Brett says, trying to smile again. “I don’t know what I’d do if anything happened to him.”

“He feels the same way about you.” She’s smiling outright now. “It’s kind of nice to see two people in love now. I didn’t think I’d see it again.”

Brett nods. “There’s a lot of love where we came from,” he says softly. “Hopefully it’ll be there when we get back.” He looks to Liam; he’s facing the window, but Brett can see the profile of his face - long, sweeping lashes, pouty lips, and a nose that has a very slight turn upwards at the tip. He smiles.

“I’ve got everything I need here anyway,” he says, and Hayden makes a soft cooing noise - teasing, Brett thinks. He laughs a bit. “Shut up. And… thanks for helping him.”

Hayden nods, rocking a little on her toes. “We should be careful if we move,” she says. “He was walking yesterday, and the day before. But we had to keep stopping.”

Brett looks back over at Liam. He’s out cold.

“We will be,” he promises. “Owen’s not going far anyway. Figured we’d rest up here for as long as we could.”

Hayden nods. “We could go get the car,” she offers. “I’d go on my own but somehow I don’t think you trust me that much yet.”

Brett smiles ruefully. “Smart, huh?” He turns to look at Liam again; he’s stirring now, and Brett’s a little concerned to see him lifting a hand to his head and groaning quietly. “If we have to. I don’t want to leave two injured people and one catatonic person on their own.”

Hayden nods; she’s watching the way he keeps turning back to Liam worriedly. “I’ll start some food,” she offers. “If you want.”

“That’d be great, thanks,” Brett murmurs, then makes a beeline for Liam. He’s stirring with a little more purpose, but his eyes are closed, and there’s a wince etched into his face.

Brett sits down on the edge of the bed, lays a hand on Liam’s upper thigh gently; Liam doesn’t flinch. “Hey,” Brett murmurs. “Just me.”

“I know.” Liam’s voice is soft, croaky with exhaustion. “Hi. Did I oversleep?”

“Not really,” Brett says, keeping his voice low. “We aren’t moving today.”

“Says who?”

“Me, Hayden, your injuries, Owen’s leg, and Vinnie’s… well. You know.”

Liam finally cracks his eyes open. “My head hurts,” he complains.

Brett nods, rubbing Liam’s temple sympathetically. “You probably have a bit of a concussion. Reckon you can eat something?”

“Mm, yeah.” Liam starts to sit up and push the blanket back; Brett helps, but tries to make his movements discreet - tries to hide the way he braces Liam’s ribs with his hands, then pulls his shoulders up as well. Liam won’t like appearing weak in front of Hayden.

“You good?” he asks softly. Liam’s upright, but he looks like he regrets it immensely.

“Yeah.” Liam cracks his neck. “Yeah, it’s just my head really.”

“Take some Tylenol for it,” Brett says. “Rest for the day.”

“Yes, Mom,” Liam teases.

“I’m serious, you - okay, careful,” Brett murmurs. Liam’s stepped down off the bed, and his leg has just about given away. He’s clutching the side of the bed and wincing.

“Ow,” Liam whispers.

“Yeah. Take some Tylenol with breakfast.” Brett glances up; Hayden’s looking away from them, pretending they don’t exist. “Can you walk on it?” Brett asks softly.

“I think so.” Liam looks worried. “It kind of hurts.”

“Yeah. Reckon your hip and thigh took most of the impact. That’s probably why.” He’s playing it off, but he’s worried too; he’s not sure how long this will incapacitate Liam, how it’s going to affect his movement; he’s not sure if Liam’s struggling because sleep has stiffened his muscles, or whether he’s gotten worse again overnight.

He watches worriedly as Liam begins to limp to the fire - slowly, wincing, with Fudge walking slowly at his side.

_Jesus Christ_ , Brett thinks, his stomach clenching anxiously. _He can barely move._

The only time he’s ever seen Liam this bad is when Liam was stabbed - even once the fever broke, Liam was weak. It wasn’t like this, though. It was different to this. He was weak for lack of food and the residual effects of the fever - this is weakness caused by genuine, moderately serious injury. And here, they can’t rest safely - not like they did in Ashburton, with winter keeping both the biters and Keepers at bay and the days short enough to avoid detection.

Here? The sun rises early, sets late, and the place is crawling with danger. They don’t have time to rest here - and even if they did, there’s nowhere to hide while they do. The hospital will only be safe for so long. They need to keep moving.

The thing is, Owen can’t move and Brett’s not sure what’ll happen if Vinnie is forced to go without finding whoever this Lex person is. Before anything, Owen’s leg needs to be fixed up.

Brett leaves Liam and Hayden at the fire to check on Owen; he groans when Brett begins poking around at his leg.

“What, you don’t even ask anymore?”

“Are you feeling better or worse than yesterday?” Brett asks.

Owen sighs. “Worse, I guess.”

The wound isn’t infected when Brett checks; he decides to scour the hospital, see what he can find that might help Owen. He’s not hopeful; the place looked picked clean on arrival.

He lets the others know what’s going on before he leaves the hospital room and begins to roam, holding a much smaller, steadier handgun.

It takes him more than an hour to search the hospital. There are a few zombies, but nothing unmanageable; he puts them down, but returns empty-handed from trying to find anything that could help Owen.

He’s climbing back up to meet the others when he comes to his decision - Owen can’t move in his state, but they need to leave. That means going to get the car and the medical supplies in it. That means going outside.

It’s never easy.

He returns to the room to find Hayden napping on her bed, Owen sleeping, and Vinnie in exactly the same spot he’s been in all morning. Liam’s moved around near the fire - he must be doing inventory. He looks better than he did this morning.

Brett crouches down in front of Liam. “Hey,” he says.

Liam looks up; his cheeks look puffy, and Brett realises, from the smell of sugar, that Liam’s got about a thousand jellybeans in his mouth. “Jesus, Li. Nobody’s gonna take them away from you.”

Liam smiles, looking ridiculously adorable and chipmunk-like in the process.

“Listen,” Brett says, and Liam chews and swallows. “I need you to tell me honestly how you’re feeling.”

Liam nods. “Uh…” He tilts his head. “I’m okay, mostly. I think it was just sleeping made me stiff. I’m still sore, but I can move.”

Brett nods slowly; he was worried Liam would say something to that effect, but he’s not surprised. Liam’s hardly walking, and this is clearly a case of “it has to get worse before it gets better”. They aren’t moving anyway, with Owen the way he is, but…

“I wanna go get the car,” Brett says. “Look, if you’re up to it, I want you to come along, okay?”

“I’m up to it,” Liam says immediately. “Why me though?”

Because Brett needs to give him the rundown on what’s been happening with Owen and Vinnie. Because they have about thirty thousand things that need to be discussed away from the prying eyes of Liam’s former friends and Hayden - who seems okay, but Brett’s just not sure about her. Or Owen and Vinnie. Or anyone that isn’t Liam.

“I like your company,” Brett says lightly. “Isn’t that enough?”

Liam nods silently. His eyes are boring into Brett’s deeply, flickering a little as they move over his face - looking for clues. Brett watches him right back for a long moment.

_What happens if one of us doesn’t make it?_ Brett wonders uneasily. _What then?_

They need to talk about that, too. If one of them gets too hurt or too sick or too whatever else to keep going… they need to talk about what the other one will do. They can’t pretend it isn’t a gruesome, terrifying reality that their days are probably short-lived, and that one of them will likely have to face the prospect of ending up alone.

Brett shudders. Liam’s already faced that before; from what he’s been told, it nearly destroyed him, too. Brett doesn’t want to think about Liam being left alone again.

They head out shortly after Brett speaks to Liam about it; Fudge comes with them, because while he might reluctantly stay with Brett when he’s ordered to, there’s no way he’s going to stay with three strangers while his masters roam off into zombie-infested territory.

"We need to be careful," Liam murmurs. "Hayden and I didn't see any Keepers on the way here, but that doesn't mean they're not around."

Brett nods. "Got it," he says.

Liam’s still limping, Brett notices. Not as badly as he has been, but badly enough to affect his pace. He wants to walk out in front, though, and he knows the way to the car, so Brett slows down to let him ahead.

“You doing okay?” Brett asks quietly.

Liam turns to him. “Yeah,” he says. “I’m okay. Kinda painful.” He’s looking around. “So why’d you bring me out here?”

“Look,” Brett says. “Owen and Vinnie - they’re not telling us something, Li. They’re lying.”

Liam turns to him, his face set into a worried expression. “About what?” he asks.

“I haven’t figured that out yet,” Brett admits. “While you were gone, Vinnie - look, the reason we had to leave the warehouse is because Vinnie wandered out, right through a horde of zombies, looking for someone named Lex.”

He watches Liam for signs that the name is familiar, but it doesn’t seem to be; Liam looks concerned, but not beyond what would be normal. “You went and got him?”

“Yeah. Took me ages to convince him to come back - and he didn’t remember you. I think something’s wrong.” He hesitates before asking the next question, but Liam’s his only point of reference for anything of this caliber. “Have you… ever done that?”

Liam seems to realise what he’s getting at immediately. “No,” he murmurs. “Doesn’t matter how bad I depersonalise or dissociate, I always remember who everyone is. Even myself.”

Brett nods. “Okay.”

“Look, Vinnie was kinda fragile when I knew him years ago,” Liam says. “So if he’s worse now it’s not all that surprising, you know? I’m just not sure what we should do about it.”

Brett shakes his head. “Neither am I,” he murmurs.

They walk in silence for a bit; Brett feels a bit better knowing that Liam knows what they’re working with now at least. Brett’s not sure it’ll help them in the long run, but…

Now he has another hard topic to bring up, one he knows Liam’s going to react adversely to. “Uh,” he says.

Liam turns to him, looking bemused. “What’s up?”

“Listen, Liam, I… when we got separated, we didn’t have a way of finding each other,” he says. “It was pure luck you thought to go back to the warehouse and follow our trail. But we can’t do that all the time. If it happens again…”

“We always find each other,” Liam says blankly.

“Yeah, but - we need to talk about what might happen if… if for whatever reason, we can’t.”

He’s got more to say, but the sentence dies when Liam’s face abruptly closes; his expression is suddenly stormy, and his shoulders have gone tense. “Liam,” he says. “Hang on-”

“I don’t wanna talk about this,” Liam says shortly, and he promptly strides away.

Episode? Brett wonders, watching Liam leave. Or tantrum?

Judging by the way Liam still stays close to him, and keeps looking over his shoulder to check Brett’s there - even as he’s very noticeably pissed off - it’s a tantrum. And Brett can work with a tantrum.

“Liam,” he says softly.

“What?” Liam snaps.

“This isn’t River’s End,” Brett starts.

“Fucking obviously,” Liam mutters, and Brett feels a surge of irritation. He quells it quickly, takes a deep breath, and continues.

“Look,” he says. “Out here, if one of us gets sick, or hurt, or bitten, or for whatever reason is completely incapable of moving or about to die… we won’t be able to just hang around and wait for things to get better. In Ashburton we had the advantage of winter and your hidey-hole. In River’s End we had medical equipment and trained doctors. Out here we’ve got sweet fuck all.”

“What’s your point?”

“We need to decide what’s going to happen in that case,” Brett says, not missing the way the muscles in Liam’s back and shoulders tighten threateningly. “We need to decide ahead of time - what’s our gameplan if one of us can’t move? If we get separated?”

“I’m never going to leave you for anything,” Liam says. “Doesn’t matter how sick or hurt you are. I won’t leave you. So you come up with a gameplan and let me know.”

Brett’s simultaneously touched and annoyed. He knows Liam’s serious about never leaving him - he’s proven that before. He also doesn’t feel like Liam’s taking their situation nearly seriously enough - like he’s refusing to acknowledge that debilitating illness or injury could be right around the corner at any given time, and that they need to be prepared.

“Would you stop walking away and listen to me?” Brett demands.

Liam stops in his tracks, then turns around. The expression on his face is deliberately neutral, and Brett suddenly thinks that maybe he’s not giving Liam enough credit; he’s trying not to lose his temper, even with Brett continuing to push him.

“Sorry,” Brett says softly. “Look. I just… I don’t want us to get split up and have no way to find you because we didn’t set up a rendezvous point. Yeah? And I don’t want… I don’t want to get sick and you-”

“This isn’t really about me,” Liam says softly.

“What do you mean?’

"If I get sick or hurt, it doesn’t matter,” Liam says simply. “You keep moving anyway. You have to. You’re humanity’s last hope or whatever. You can afford to leave me behind. If you get sick? We stop everything. People need you alive.”

“People?” Brett asks. “What people? There’s no one left.”

“Me,” Liam says, his voice a little shaky. “I need you alive.”

There’s a long silence. Liam looks at the ground, scuffing his feet in the dirt.

“I still love you, you know,” he says awkwardly. “Even when I’m snappy and mean. I still love you.”

Brett smiles softly. “I’ve never doubted that, Li.”

“Okay,” Liam mumbles. “Good.”

They keep moving; after almost twenty minutes, Liam sighs, stops, and turns to Brett.

“If something happens to me,” he says, “and I can’t… keep going, for whatever reason, and it’s safe, and you have time… would you stay?”

Brett’s lungs clench so hard for a moment he thinks he’s going to pass out on the spot. “Stay until you…?”

“Die,” Liam finishes for him. “Yeah. Would you… only if there’s time, and it’s safe, I just… I’ve always been really scared of being alone when it happened.”

Brett swallows the lump in his throat. He’s never going to get used to Liam admitting to being afraid; it never fails to remind him that Liam’s barely eighteen years old and already more of an adult than anyone should have to be. “Yeah,” he says. “I would.”

He doesn’t say it, but he knows that if it comes down to it, he’d stay regardless of whether it was safe or there was time. Maybe it makes him weak, but he doubts he’d ever be able to leave Liam like that.

“I’d stay for you too,” Liam says suddenly. “You know that, right?”

“I know.” Liam seems a little calmer, and so Brett joins his side. “You did in Ashburton.”

He remembers it clearly, amongst all the other shit he doesn’t remember clearly; Liam refused to leave, even after Brett told him the virus would go airborne eventually. Liam was clearly afraid, but he didn’t leave. And that was before they were even together.

Liam stops suddenly, looks around. Brett notices that Fudge’s tail is down and feels a thrill of nerves; both of them have gone into what Brett likes to call sixth-sense mode.

“Liam?” he asks.

“Shh,” Liam says curtly.

So Brett shuts up. Liam turns a little. “Someone else is nearby,” he says quietly.

“Are you sure?” Brett asks. “Does there have to be? Can’t you just be paranoid like everyone else and not right all the time?”

Liam gives him a fond smile. “Sorry, are my spidey-senses making your life hard?” He’s joking around, but he’s quiet, and he’s beginning to head for a nearby building.

“It’s not your spidey-senses,” Brett mumbles. “It’s what they’re picking up that’s the problem.”

Liam’s moving faster, so Brett jogs to keep up. Fudge is silent, but his tail is down and his ears are back; whatever’s wrong, the danger clearly hasn’t passed yet.

“Liam,” Brett says. “We should-”

He hears a whistling sound, turns around - feels an impact on his skull, right above his hairline. It’s so hard and fast he barely notices that he’s crumpling to the ground like a wet paper plane; there’s warmth seeping down his face.

“Brett!” Liam’s voice yells.

Brett raises a hand to his head, realises the warmth is wet and that it’s blood; his head is swimming, and he can’t keep his eyes open, even as he feels Liam shaking his shoulders and hears Fudge barking distantly.

“Sorry, Liam,” he murmurs, and promptly loses consciousness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ... and it's another cliffhanger jesus christ i'm the worst lol


	29. Chapter Twenty Nine - Ghosts

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 'tis i the piece of shit who ignores almost all of her creative pursuits waddup
> 
> thank you guys for being patient with me <3 the good news is that i've already starter chapter 30 lmao 
> 
> **trigger warnings: mentions of attempted rape, characters being less than understanding about mental illness, slight homophobia**. please read carefully  <3

**Chapter Twenty Nine - Ghosts**

“… Please, Brett, come on…”

Sound filters back in before anything else does; it takes him a while to register the voice speaking as Liam’s, and another to realise that it’s high-pitched with desperation.

He shifts a little, groaning. Whatever he’s lying on moves; he realises, from how hard and warm it is, that his shoulders and head must be in Liam’s lap, across his thighs.

“Brett?” Liam asks hopefully.

“Hi,” Brett mumbles.

“Shit, fuck, I’m really glad you’re awake,” Liam says, and he definitely sounds relieved. “Okay, okay, I know your head’s probably hurting like a bitch but we really need to get up and move, okay? I can help you, but we need to go.”

“Why?” Brett asks groggily.

“There are Keepers around,” Liam says. “We-”

“What happened?” Brett mumbles dizzily.

“You got hit in the head - it must’ve been a rock or something from a slingshot, ‘cause if a bullet had hit you there, you’d be dead. I dragged you out of there. I think we’re safe for now but they’re swarming all over the place.”

“Slingshot?” Brett croaks. “Rock?”

“Yeah.” Liam sounds downright scared. “They’re running low on ammo I think. Probably because they’re shit shots. It uh-” Brett feels Liam’s hand then, near his head, and a cold rag presses into a horrifically tender spot on his forehead, near his temple and hairline. “It’s here. You were bleeding pretty bad. I think it’s stopped now.”

Brett licks his lips weakly. “How long?”

“How long were you out? An hour. Maybe more.” Liam shifts a little beneath him. “They haven’t followed us. But we should - like they’ll move eventually. We need to go. Can - I can help, I’m sorry I’m badgering you-”

 _Run on sentences. Rambling. Stammering. Disjointed thoughts_. Liam’s probably hovering on the cusp of a panic attack or dissociative episode. He sounds nervous, too, high-pitched and uncertain.

Brett makes a concentrated effort to move. “Okay. Just - gimme a second.”

“Okay.” Liam’s hands are fluttering nervously near his neck. “Okay, sure.”

Brett goes to open his eyes - he wants to see Liam, be reassured that he’s there. “How’d you get me out?” he asks. His head’s pounding, but he’s going to have to deal for now.

“I just kind of - I got out the shotgun and started firing randomly and they scattered. I don’t think they have a lot of experience with people firing back because it scared 'em off.”

Brett’s trying to open his eyes, but there’s no sight filtering in. The silence stretches, longer and longer until Liam says, hesitantly, “Brett?”

“Liam, are my eyes open?”

“Yeah,” Liam says confusedly.

Brett’s stomach lurches. “Is - is anything in them?”

He feels Liam lean over - his stomach presses into the top of Brett’s head as he does. Brett imagines the way his t-shirt is probably sagging forward and showing off his chest and collarbones, even though now is really not the time to get a boner.

“I - I can’t tell,” Liam says. “Maybe. It’s dark here. Why?”

Brett swallows, trying not to lose it and panic. “Liam, I can’t see,” he whispers.

There’s a long pause. “What?”

“I can’t see,” Brett moans. “At all.”

There’s another pause; Brett can feel Liam’s breath quickening. “Are… are you-”

“Liam, I can’t see a fucking thing. How dark is it?”

“Not dark enough that you wouldn’t be able to see,” Liam says shakily. “I… okay, how do you wanna play this?”

Brett tries to clear the thickening fog of panic before it can take hold - he and Liam are gonna have to work together here, and if one or both of them are freaking, it’s not going to work. “Can you give me a rundown?” he asks weakly. “What’s going on?”

“Um, okay.” He feels Liam’s arm move. “You’ve been out an hour or so. Maybe a little longer. The Keepers scattered, but the gunfire attracted some zombies, I think. Plus the Keepers might’ve come back by now, but - they aren’t well trained. If we moved fast and stayed in the back streets we’d probably be okay.”

“How far from the car are we?” It’s why they’re out here in the first place.

“Not more than a mile,” Liam says uneasily. “Brett, is it possible to go blind from being hit in the head?”

Well, it probably fucking is - there are so many things that can go wrong if the human brain is knocked so much as a fraction it’s a wonder anyone is still alive - but Brett doesn’t want to think about the possibility of being permanently blinded.

“Probably,” he says. “I don’t know what’s wrong, Liam.”

“We’ll figure it out,” Liam promises. “But first we need to get the fuck out of here.”

“Where are we?”

“Abandoned carpark. It’s creepy as fuck. But there don’t seem to be zombies or Keepers.”

“What’s above us?”

“A Macy’s. I think.”

“Couldn’t have been a pharmacy,” Brett moans unhappily. “We could go-”

“Wait,” Liam says. “I have an idea.”

“I’m all ears. Literally.”

“The Keepers will be expecting us to move up to try and get away from them,” Liam says. “So we can’t do that and we shouldn’t anyway because we could get stuck up there, and then we’re even more screwed. But if we went down…”

“They won’t expect that,” Brett murmurs, blinking rapidly. No luck. “But how?”

“You aren’t gonna like this, Brett.”

~*~

Brett’s head is hurting like hell, but he manages to get to his feet with Liam’s help. Liam leans him up against a wall and, in a low voice, says, “Fudge, stay.”

“Fudge is okay?” Brett asks.

“He’s spooked. But he’s okay.” Liam’s hand takes his, and a moment later, Brett feels fur under his fingertips. “See?”

“Where are you going?”

“I’m gonna open up the manhole, climb down, suss the place out, then come back. I’ll get you down there somehow.”

“Ladder? Manhole?” Brett feels very afraid suddenly. “Liam-”

“I told you you weren’t gonna like it,” Liam says. “But them’s the breaks.”

 _Where the hell did he pick up that turn of phrase_? Brett wonders, even as he realises that Liam’s left him and that he can hear the scraping of a manhole cover opening. He tries not to freak out - Liam’s good at dealing with zombies, and he’ll be fine.

He waits. Fudge turns in a circle and gives a quiet whine, but otherwise stays where he is. Brett starts counting the seconds in his head - ten to not be able to hear Liam’s footsteps on the ladder anymore. Twenty before he hears a splash somewhere. Forty five before panic sets in and he’s convinced Liam’s dead.

It’s five minutes before he hears Liam’s feet on the ladder again. He can tell it’s Liam, too, because Liam always puts more weight on his left foot than his right - his right knee suffers a little from an old lacrosse injury.

“Liam?” he whispers.

“Hi.” Liam’s fingertips brush his shoulder gently; he’s panting, sounds out of breath. “Do you trust me?”

“With my life. You know that.”

“Okay. You aren’t gonna like this, Brett - like you really aren’t gonna like it.”

“Doesn’t matter if I like it as long as we get out of here, Li.”

“Alright. This way.” Liam’s leading him away; he’s so close Brett can smell the sharpness of his sweat, almost like he’s picking up fear. Fudge is quiet too, but Brett can hear his claws clicking gently across the concrete, and the dog is close enough for him to touch. Staying close to Brett, probably on Liam’s instruction.

They walk for a while. Brett feels the ground changing, sloping downwards, and adjusts his pace accordingly; Liam’s nearby, ready to steady him.

“We walked past the manhole,” Brett realises. “Didn’t we?”

“Yeah.” Liam’s subdued. “Fudge can’t go down ladders. I found another entrance though. It’s in the basement area.”

They keep walking. Before long - before five minutes - the air goes cooler, but still, and Liam stops. Brett listens intently and manages to pick up faint echoing sounds.

“Okay.” Liam hesitates. “You sure you trust me?”

“You know I do.”

There’s a scraping noise; Liam grunts. Brett imagines the way his shoulders and back are probably straining with the effort of moving whatever it is he’s shifting.

“Let’s do this,” Liam says. “C'mon.”

Brett follows, hesitantly. Liam warns him about a step up, takes Brett’s arm to help him. That’s when the water becomes apparent - it smells bad, too.

“Liam?” Brett whispers.

He hears sloshing nearby. “I’m here,” Liam whispers back. “Come on. You need to step down. Careful.”

Brett steps down - his stomach lurches as his foot drops, and Liam grabs him quickly. He hears rushing water, suddenly, feels it around his foot.

“Liam?” he asks.

“We’re in the sewers,” Liam explains quickly. “It’s underground, so we might be able to work our way back to the hospital from here without the Keepers finding us.”

“Good plan,” Brett whispers. “I still can’t see though.”

“At all?” Liam asks, and Brett shakes his head. He hears Liam sigh - it trembles in the air between them like a newborn about to cry - and then the snick of a zip opening.

“I’m gonna tie you to me, okay? You can keep a hand on my waist or something. Just follow me. You’ll be safe, I promise.”

Sewers, Brett realises. This is how Garrett…

“Liam,” he murmurs. “I’m sorry you have to be down here.”

There’s a long pause; Liam doesn’t realise what he’s getting at, evidently. Then, after a moment, he inhales - a sharp, pained noise. Brett almost says something, goes to backtrack or clarify, but then Liam says, “We were kids. He was reckless and I wasn’t paying attention. Things are different now.”

“I’m also blind-”

“Doesn’t matter. You’ve got me, I can see, and this time around I’m not as scared.” There’s more splashing, and Brett feels a tug; they’re moving. “Let’s go.”

Brett swallows. “Anyone ever tell you you’ve got balls of steel?”

“It’s been mentioned.” Brett can hear a smile in Liam’s voice. He finds Liam’s waist, cautiously, and holds on, marvelling in the sinewy flex of Liam’s muscles beneath his skin. Liam’s grown a lot since they met - Brett wishes he had a photo for comparison sometimes.

“Where are we going?” he asks.

“Away from here. Somewhere safe where I can work out what’s wrong with you.”

“Any ideas?”

“You’re the fuckin’ genius, not me,” Liam mutters dryly. “You might have to help me out a little.”

“How’s that?”

“How do I treat a head wound?”

“Well, normally it would be rest, lots of fluids, checkups every few hours, and potentially doctors’ appointments. But, what with this being zombie Armageddon and you having the education level of the average fourteen-year-old-”

“Right. That’s okay. I’ve read books. Same as going to med school, right?”

Brett smiles shakily; Liam’s trying to cheer him up, and it’s obvious in the way he’s taking all of Brett’s pokes at his education well in his stride.

They stop walking. Brett strains his hearing; the sounds of the sewer echo around him endlessly, and he swallows. The only thing he can really hear, with any clarity, is the sound of Liam’s breathing - tight, controlled. He’s listening too. For what, Brett doesn’t know, but…

“This way,” Liam murmurs uneasily.

“Li?”

“I thought I heard something.”

They’re quiet after that. A few times, Liam pauses, and they all stand still enough they’d probably make convincing mannequins. It’s never for long, though; Brett knows Liam is toeing the line between being cautious and moving quickly enough to evade the Keepers.

“You know sewers?” Brett asks softly.

“Yeah.” Liam hesitates before speaking again; Brett knows Liam’s licking his lips, because he knows Liam, and he knows Liam gets nervous and jumpy in enclosed spaces. “They follow a grid. If you memorise the grid, you can get pretty much anywhere.”

“And where are we going?”

“Apartments. I hope.”

After almost twenty minutes walking through the sewers, it starts to warm up; Liam’s breathing gets heavier. They’re approaching ground level, or at least somewhere near it.

Liam stops walking. “Alright,” he says. “Just wait for a moment, okay?”

Brett stands still, listening as Liam begins to shift a grate - it sounds like it’s a lot of effort, judging by the amount of muted noise Liam’s making, and he wishes he was more useful. Liam’s strong, but nothing will make up for Brett’s height or the four years in age he has on Liam.

“Alright,” Liam pants. “C'mon.”

They stay on the ground floor; for a moment, Brett’s not sure what’s happening or where they are, until Liam hisses, “Yes!” and begins to hustle him along faster.

“Apartments?” Brett asks.

“Apartments. Hit the jackpot. Alright, c'mon.”

Liam leads them down a few hallways, but they’re still only on the ground floor; they must have exited the sewers through the basement. Brett knows Liam’s rules - move fast and stay on the ground, because going up when fleeing zombies is a fucking deathtrap waiting to happen.

“In,” Liam whispers. “C'mon. I need to spot check. Stay here.”

Brett listens, his heart pounding, as Liam checks the apartment they’re in - he hears doors opening, Liam’s footsteps across carpet, then floorboards. It can’t be a big place, because Liam’s rushing back to him less than two minutes later.

“This way.”

“Where are we going?”

“Bathroom.”

“Why-”

“I had an idea.” Liam sounds almost excited. “I think - well, you’ll see.”

“Right,” Brett says dubiously.

“Oh, shit. Sorry, bad choice of words.” Brett’s startled to hear the sound of running water, and then Liam’s hands, guiding him - getting him to lift his legs and then sit. He splutters when water starts falling into his face.

“Shh,” Liam whispers. “I only cleared this apartment. Might not be safe anywhere else.”

“What are you-”

“Hold still,” Liam murmurs. “Keep your eyes open.”

He does, even as the water - stinging and cold despite the summer heat - rushes into them. Liam’s wiping at his face and hair with a cloth or something; Fudge is panting nearby.

A chink of light appears in his vision; Brett blinks rapidly, and suddenly, his eyesight is clearing. Liam’s leaning over him, his mouth slightly open as he wipes at Brett’s face tenderly.

Brett reaches up, holds Liam’s neck. Liam looks down at him, surprised, then looking relieved.

“You can see me?”

“I think you’re the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen,” Brett croaks.

Liam’s face breaks into a smile. “Jesus, dude, no need to make it mushy. You had - well, I thought you might have blood in your eyes. That’s happened to me before.”

“Doing what?” Brett asks, but just as he finishes his sentence, he hears it - a door closing, quietly, and very close.

Liam’s frozen above him; the water is still running, loudly, completely giving their position away. Zombies don’t close doors; whoever it is nearby, it’s bad news. They’re in the bathroom - now that Brett can look, he sees that the only window is high up and too narrow for even Liam to fit through.

Liam holds a finger to his lips, then begins to slowly step out of the tub. Brett recognises it now - he’s sitting in it, under the spray.

He watches silently, heart in his throat, as Liam leans towards his crossbow and picks it up. He moves, slowly, until his back is against the wall next to the door, crossbow raised, utterly still.

Whoever’s out there is going to hear the running water, Brett realises. Someone followed us, somehow.

A whistle sounds. Fudge’s ears prick; a look of dread so frighteningly intense it makes Brett’s gut lurch crosses Liam’s face.

“You know,” a voice calls, “it’s just rude to not greet house guests at the door.”

Liam closes his eyes, swallows. Brett’s trying to pinpoint the owner of the voice. He’s heard it before, but not often… still, Liam obviously knows it, and he’s obviously afraid.

“How’s Brett?” the voice asks. “Brains scrambled? Drooling yet? They always drool when it’s a traumatic head injury.”

Liam’s eyes open. Brett finds himself grateful, for a fleeting second, that that particular kind of glare has never been aimed at him; God knows it could cut trees to the ground.

“Turns out, the kids I train have terrible aim,” the voice says. “Only reason he’s alive, you know. It was a rock. Slingshot to the head. Too bad I didn’t give that guy a gun. If I had, your boyfriend’s brains would be all over the pavement and I’d have one less fucking thing to deal with.”

 _He hasn’t come in_ , Brett realises. _How come he hasn’t come in? He knows we’re here. He knows I’m injured. So why…_

“You always play so hard to get, Liam,” the voice coos. “I feel like it was just a few days ago that I chased you around the city. Too bad Hayden - ungrateful bitch - felt like playing hero that day. I would’ve had you.”

Theo, Brett realises suddenly. It’s Theo.

“You know, you’re pretty,” Theo calls. “Brett, he’s too old. Probably take him to the meat-packing plant, know what I’m saying? But you’re young. Good-looking. You could make something of that. Get yourself off the streets… find people who’d take care of you.”

Liam closes his eyes again, swallows. His jaw is clenched; he’s clearly having a hard time dealing with what Theo’s saying.

“His name was Doug,” Theo’s voice says.

Liam doesn’t say anything. He’s still got his back against the wall, and Brett’s still sitting in the bathtub. If Theo comes in here, Brett will be right in his line of sight.

“Oh, come on, I know you’re curious,” Theo says. “Doug. We all know what he was like, Liam. Liked pretty guys like you.”

Doug. Brett sees the realisation cross Liam’s face - Doug is the previously-nameless Keeper that tried to rape Liam. Brett wants to reach out and hold him, but he can’t, not without giving them away - even as he watches Liam’s face close off and the clarity and presence in his eyes begin to fade.

That’s when Brett freaks. Liam hasn’t slept, hasn’t eaten, is contending with a head injury and days of near-constant stress, and he’s dissociating right here, on the spot, at the mention of the Keeper - Doug. Exhaustion always makes it worse. Liam only seemed fine in River’s End because he was taking care of himself. Eating, sleeping, unwinding.

Brett reaches out, slowly, his hand shaking, but it’s too late - Liam’s completely dissociated, and Brett can tell by the frighteningly blank expression on his face. Sometimes, dissociation just means Liam’s struggling to stay in his own head, depersonalises, and needs to just be left in a quiet, dark place for a few minutes.

But other times - like this - it’s like Liam exits his body completely and goes elsewhere. Brett’s never seen it happen - only knows that it does because Liam spent a lot of time doing it when he was in the coma. He had to hear it from Kira and the others. And those episodes are longer - up to hours long.

 _We don’t have hours_ , Brett thinks, panicking. _Theo’s right outside. There’s probably more of them_. And, in the street outside, he can hear the groan of zombies.

He freezes.

 _What do I do?_ He thinks frantically. _What do I do?_

Brett might be a planner, but he’s shit at improvisation and his hand-to-hand combat is less than stellar; running and fighting are Liam’s specialties, not Brett’s. Except Liam’s gone and Brett needs to get them both out of this safely.

“So?” Theo calls. “I know there’s no way you don’t remember, Liam. Doug’s a big guy, you know? What happened there? How far did he get?”

Brett can only be grateful that Liam’s not even present to hear what Theo’s saying as his brain scrambles to find a solution to their predicament - a way out.

“He wasn’t gonna kill you, you know,” Theo says, sounding bored. “He was just gonna fuck you. Probably tie you up, keep you for himself till someone confiscated you and sold you on. But he wasn’t ever gonna kill you.”

Brett grits his teeth, swallows, and begins to slowly ease himself out of the tub. Liam doesn’t move, doesn’t try to stop him; he’s totally gone. This isn’t the partial dissociation that’s normal for Liam; this is a full-blown episode, complete with Liam’s total absence from his own body.

“Damn,” Theo says. “You’re good. Holding out for a long time.”

If Brett can grab one of Liam’s guns, a knife, or even the crossbow, he’s got a fighting chance. All he has to do is wait for Theo to tire of his psychological torture and progress to the door of the bathroom; Brett can shoot him in the head and move on. Not even have to deal with the zombified form.

He finally steps out of the tub and reaches Liam, just managing to pry the crossbow from his lax hands. He’s gotta get Liam out of here, get him somewhere safe and quiet he can rest.

He aims the crossbow at the door, breathing hard. He’s held it, but he’s never actually shot it; all he can do is try to mimic Liam’s stance. It’s fucking heavy, though.

“Alright, Liam,” Theo calls impatiently. “Fine. I get it - you aren’t gonna play. Guess I’m gonna have to come looking.”

Looking back on it later, this is the point where it all goes wrong; Theo rounds the corner, faster than Brett was expecting, and holding a gun; Brett fires the crossbow, only the kickback is a thousand times more powerful than he ever expected, and instead of hitting Theo in the head, it hits him in the shoulder. Fudge barks, and all hell breaks loose.

Brett gives up on the crossbow immediately; it’s gonna hinder him, not help him. Theo’s raising the gun by the time he does, but he’s a little too late; Brett charges and tackles, and really, this is the kind of shit he was built for. He’s tall, he’s heavy, and what he lacks in melee combat skill he makes up for in brute strength. Theo’s smaller than he is at any rate, and is contending with the arrow in his shoulder.

He doesn’t even look at Liam as he and Theo tumble out into the hallway, yelling. The gun goes off, and a bullet ricochets into the wall behind Brett’s head. Fudge has begun barking. Liam - Brett doesn’t know where Liam-

“Can’t make it fucking simple, huh!” Theo bellows, and his knee comes up into Brett’s stomach. Brett loses the air from his lungs in a gust, and he’s still trying to remember how to breathe properly when Theo yanks a knife out from a strap on his thigh.

Brett rolls; the knife slices into his forearm, not deep, but enough to bleed. He’s back on his feet soon enough, still wheezing, and immediately notices that Theo’s headed for the gun again.

Brett lunges, manages to catch Theo around the waist, and drags him down. The knife is an issue; the gun is a fucking disaster. Theo’s a good shot from what Liam said, and in close quarters, they’ll both be toast if he gets his hands on it again.

Theo howls as he hits the ground; the arrow is forced deeper into his shoulder. This is Brett’s advantage; if he can use that injury against Theo, make it worse-

Except he’s failed to account for the fact that Theo wants to survive just as badly as he does, as Liam does - as anyone does, now. The people who are still alive at this point are because they’re either smart enough, tough enough, or protected by someone who’s one or both of the former.

Theo jerks his head back; it slams into Brett’s mouth, and he feels his teeth bite into his tongue and lip, blood bursting across his tastebuds. He chokes, and Theo has him on the ground in about two second flat - leaning one hand against Brett’s windpipe, his injured arm limp.

“You think you can kill me?” he snarls. “I’ve killed people I care about more than you over much less. And I’m going to do the same to you - I’m going to kill you, and before I do, I’m gonna make sure you know that your twink boyfriend is going to fucking suffer when I hand him over to-”

Brett sees movement behind Theo, and he barely has time to even process it before there’s a sharp, resounding crack as he’s hit upside the head; he collapses forward, and Brett shoves him off.

Liam’s standing above him, holding a baseball bat and looking shell-shocked. Brett hauls himself to his feet; Liam must’ve shaken himself out of dissociation when he heard all the commotion.

“Liam,” Brett croaks.

Liam’s eyes travel him slowly, dazedly - Brett’s seen habitual pot-smokers with more awareness than what Liam’s currently exhibiting. He’s clearly not all there right now, just a little. Enough to bash Theo’s skull in, apparently.

“You’re bleeding,” Liam says blankly.

“I know. Are you okay?”

Liam raises a hand to his forehead and wipes his face; he shakes his head.

“Okay.” Brett’s shaken, and not just by the fight or everything Theo said before and during it. “Sit down. Okay? Sit down where I can see you.”

Liam sits on the floor, right where he is, with no argument. Brett darts into the bathroom, grabs their packs, and is back out in the living room before Liam has time to notice him missing.

The first thing he does is truss Theo up, tightly, and clear the area around him; he doesn’t want him to be able to get free, and he can’t shake the feeling that he should just kill the guy - but something stops him. Some stupidly morally-guided part of him is telling him he can’t do that, not when Theo’s unconscious and has no means of defending himself.

He reaches for the medkit next, taking a brief break to look at Liam worriedly; Liam’s sitting up against the wall now, his legs drawn to his chest, his breathing fragile and frightened.

He looks at his arm. It’s cut, not that badly, but bleeding enough that any zombies will notice it. He fishes a bandage out from the medkit and starts to wind it around the wound haphazardly. He only needs it covered for now; he can treat it better later, once he’s found somewhere safe for them to rest.

“How did he know?” Liam croaks.

Brett finishes bandaging his arm. “Huh?”

Liam licks his lips. “About the Keeper,” Liam whispers. “About nearly getting raped. How did he know?”

Brett stops. Because Liam’s right - short of Liam telling Theo himself, there’s no way Theo could have known about Liam’s near rape. The Keeper - and he doesn’t deserve a name, so Brett won’t use the one they’ve been given - died as a result of attacking Liam, and the only other person who could have known was Trent, who never spoke to anyone after encountering Brett and Liam.

“It doesn’t matter,” Brett says shortly. “C'mon, we need to move, okay?”

But Liam doesn’t make to get up; he’s trembling, and his fingers are knotted together around the back of his neck. Brett quells the rising irritation and tries to replace it with concern - Liam’s freaking out, and it isn’t his fault, and Brett getting mad at him for something he can’t control will only make him worse, not better.

He kneels down, wincing at the pain in his stomach from where Theo drove him into the wall. “Liam,” he whispers, sliding his hands onto Liam’s. They’re cold, even though it must be more than a hundred outside. “Liam, hey.”

Liam looks at him, but barely. He looks like he’s on the brink of checking out again.

Brett pushes his hair back with one hand. “I’m here,” he says helplessly. “I know you’re scared. But - but we can’t stay here, okay? We have to keep moving. I’m gonna get you out of here, but I - I need you to get up, okay? I can’t carry you. But if you can - stand, maybe, and walk, I promise I’ll get you out of here and keep you safe.”

A few tears roll down Liam’s cheeks. “Brett, I don’t know if…”

“I’ll keep you safe,” Brett promises, his voice breaking. “Liam, baby, I’m gonna make sure you’re okay. But we _have_ to move. Even if it’s just to another building.”

There’s a long pause; Liam shuts his eyes. Fudge whimpers quietly, his ears pinned back.

 _I might not be able to get him to move_ , Brett realises. The dread is cold down the back of his neck and in the pit of his stomach. _He might not be able to do it. Even if he wants to._

Just as he’s thinking it, Liam moves a little - he withdraws his hands from the back of his neck and slides one up to Brett’s wrist, holds on weakly. His eyes are open again.

“Let’s go,” he whispers.

Brett hates that he doesn’t have the time to check if Liam’s sure; he can’t afford for it not to be true. He stands up, slowly, and begins helping Liam to his feet. He’s shaking like he’s cold, but he’s sweating from the heat of the day.

“Just keep moving,” Brett says shakily. “Okay? Leave the zombies to me. You just keep moving.”

“Okay,” Liam says - his voice is still quiet. “Where’s…”

“I tied him up. Let’s go. Stay behind me. Stay close to me.”

Liam does as he’s told; Brett picks up his crossbow and pack, shoulders them both. His head’s aching fiercely but if Liam needs to run, he can’t have a pack weighing him down. Not like this.

They head out onto the street - going so slow Brett’s feet almost ache with it. Liam blinks into the bright sunlight, clearly disoriented - his dissociative episodes are bad enough as it is, and Brett’s seen him come-to in familiar places with no idea where he is. He can’t imagine what it must be like for Liam to come around in an unfamiliar environment, under threat of death, and having to immediately move and run for his life.

“Owen,” Liam says suddenly.

Brett turns to him; Liam hasn’t spoken in a while. “What?”

Liam blinks at him blearily. “Owen,” he reiterates. “We’re out here to get him medicine.”

Shit. Brett had totally forgotten; that is why they’re out here. To find the car and get Owen some medication, maybe even some saline to increase his blood pressure. Not ideal, but short of a transfusion, it’s all they can do.

“Okay,” Brett soothes. “We’ll find the car. But not right now.”

“No,” Liam says. “We’re close.”

“Liam-”

“I just… don’t want him to die.”

Brett turns around. “Liam, you’re totally spaced out,” he says helplessly. “You can barely string a sentence together. I’m not saying we won’t go. I’m saying we’re not going until you’ve - I dunno, rested, or eaten, or something-”

Liam’s fingers tangle with his, and Brett stops. Liam rarely seeks contact like this, and he’s staring up at Brett helplessly, looking pale and wrung out in the midday sun. He doesn’t have the words, Brett guesses.

Brett clenches his teeth. “Okay,” he relents. “You know what? I’m gonna find somewhere safe for you to stay with Fudge. Then I’m going to find the car. Then we’re going back.”

“Not safe-”

“None of it is safe.”

Liam shakes his head. “I’m, I’m getting better,” he says, stumbling over the words. “I am. I know you don’t believe me - I wouldn’t believe me either - but I can keep it together. Just, I dunno. Until we get back?”

He doesn’t sound sure, and he sure as hell doesn’t look sure - but what are Brett’s other options? Spend extra time finding somewhere for Liam to hole up with Fudge, then more extra time circling back for him, with no guarantee that Liam won’t have dissociated again? Or - take Liam with him, hope like hell that they don’t run into more trouble, and coax Liam into sticking with him. Either way, Brett runs the risk of Liam coming into contact with more Keepers, or maybe zombies.

The second option is only riskier when Brett takes protecting Liam into account. Otherwise, they’re both equally as shitty. He has no idea where the other Keepers are, even. Only Theo pursued them into the building, and they were able to leave…

“Let’s go,” he says tersely. “Come on. We have to find the car.”

~*~

“How do you think he found us?”

Liam looks up blankly. They’ve made their way to the car, and Brett’s been chattering at Liam softly, as much as he can - trying to get Liam to stay with him. It’s only just occurred to him that they took the sewers, not an above-ground route. Theo still knew where they were.

“Liam?” he prompts.

Liam shakes his head a little. “He might’ve, uh - maybe he followed us? Into the sewers?” he asks. “I dunno, he… last time he tried to herd me into a specific area, I got away. Moved too fast. Maybe he thought it was… easier to let me corner myself?”

That would make sense, and Liam’s talking, so Brett’s killed two birds with one stone. He still wants to know how Theo knew about Liam’s near-rape at the hands of the Keeper, but that’s not terribly important right now. What’s important is getting the medical supplies back to Owen and getting Liam under shelter.

Brett rifles through their pack, finds a bottle of water, and unscrews the lid before handing it to Liam. “Drink,” he says softly. “You look beat.”

Liam drinks obediently. Brett watches him, unable to believe that they’ve been in this godforsaken city for almost a week now - or maybe it’s longer - and that Liam’s mental health has deteriorated this badly. And Brett knows that the kid is just tired, and overheated, and probably really hungry at this point - all of which have a direct impact on how well Liam manages his PTSD - but it’s frightening to watch, knowing there’s no real safe space he can take Liam in order to calm him down.

Liam hands the water back, and Brett takes the opportunity to down two Tylenol for his head, which is pounding.

“Are we taking the car?” Liam asks. His voice still sounds off - like Liam’s talking to him, but only because he knows he should, and is really a thousand miles away thinking about something else. Even as he asks questions about their situation, he’s absent.

“Not safe,” Brett murmurs. “It makes a lot of noise, and if they start shooting, we’ll get trapped in it pretty fast.”

Liam nods. “Okay.” He looks at Brett, for a moment - really seems to see him, instead of looking through him. “Do you want me to carry something?”

Brett wants to cry. Liam’s still not one hundred percent with him, but he’s edging towards it and he’s trying to be helpful. “That’s okay,” Brett says, trying not to let his voice break. “How 'bout you just let me take care of you, huh?”

Liam blinks. “I can carry something…”

“I know. But if something happens I need you to be able to run fast. You can’t with a pack.” Brett picks them up; they’re heavier for the medical supplies inside them. “C'mon, Li. Let’s get moving.”

Liam falls into step beside him. Brett keeps a lookout - there’s errant zombies here and there, but nothing threatening, and sometimes, killing them can be worse than just leaving them. If he kills them, Keepers stumbling through the area will know that they were here. If he just leaves them be, and he and Liam stay quiet…

They’re walking a little more quickly than they were before, and that’s something Brett can get behind; he knows which direction to head in, and what the building looks like, but the specifics have evaded him and he has no idea how far away they are anymore.

Still, even if Liam’s still looking a little confused - like he isn’t sure how he got outside or when - he’s sure-footed as he threads his way through broken-down cars and side streets. He knows where they’re going.

“Theo?” he asks suddenly.

“Tied him up,” Brett says. “With any luck the biters’ll get him.”

Liam nods. “Do you think the other Keepers will find him?”

“Might do. Let’s hope not.” Brett looks around. “You know where we are?”

“Yeah. I know how to get back. I’m, uh, not that scrambled, don’t worry.”

Scrambled. Like he’s an egg shattered open in a frypan, burning under the heat. Brett hates that visual, so he shakes it off and makes an effort to keep up - Liam’s walking a little more quickly now.

“We wasted time,” he realises aloud. “Didn’t we?”

“Not much,” Brett hedges.

Liam turns to him, looking a little scared. “How much?” he demands. “How long were you trying to get me to move for?”

“Fifteen minutes,” Brett says, and his voice sounds pleading, even to his own ears. “Liam - Liam, come on, it’s… we’re still gonna make it back in time, you couldn’t help it.”

The words bounce off Liam like water off a duck’s back, and Brett can see it; his jaw is clenched. “I’m gonna get us all killed,” he says. “I can’t keep pulling that shit-”

“You aren’t pulling anything!” Brett interrupts. “You aren’t doing it on purpose!”

“Does that even matter?” Liam asks. “Look, Brett - sugar coat it all you want. But I’m losing my fucking mind out here and it’s starting to affect our safety. Can’t keep doing this - I’m gonna snap before anything else does.”

Brett stops, and Liam follows suit; he stares at Liam helplessly for a moment. He wants to tell Liam he’s wrong, but he can’t, because Liam’s right. His mental health has degraded so vastly Brett isn’t sure how to handle it anymore, and Liam’s clearly noticed a difference in his own functioning. And he would. Because he’s not a kid and not stupid.

“No,” he says, and his voice breaks. “I won’t…”

Liam’s face softens, then, losing all its anger and irritation. “Hey,” he says. “I’m not losing it just yet, okay? We get out of the city, I’ll be fine.” He sounds falsely cheerful when he says it, like he knows it isn’t true - but he’s trying to believe it for Brett’s benefit.

They keep walking. Liam stays by his side now, bumping into him a little to direct him.

“I’ll look after you, you know,” Brett says.

Liam looks at him. “Huh?”

Brett avoids Liam’s eyes. “If you get really bad,” he clarifies. “If you’re too out of it to take care of yourself. I’ll do it. I won’t leave you behind, or let you get hurt.”

Liam stops, looks at him for a long moment. Then, silently, he’s pulling Brett down by the back of his neck and kissing him - not just a peck, either, but really kissing him, like he’s trying to convey something words can’t quite explain.

Brett kisses him back, bumping his forehead into Liam’s clumsily. “I love you,” he whispers.

Liam pulls away. “Love you too,” he says softly. “Let’s keep moving.”

~*~

It takes them almost half an hour to find their way back; by the time they do, Fudge is panting miserably and Liam’s breathing is strained and exhausted.

Brett’s not faring all that well himself, but still, he hasn’t faced the same level of exertion as Liam or Fudge have over the last few days. They stop a few times, with Brett trying to get Liam to drink as much water as he possibly can. Liam’s drenched in sweat, and the back of his neck, his chest, and his face are beginning to tint red with sunburn.

“Look on the bright side,” Brett says. “If we’re struggling, there’s no way a bunch of half-starved Keepers are gonna bother pursuing us this far. If they do-”

“They’ll melt,” Liam says tiredly.

“Right,” Brett agrees.

They have to run for the hospital when they get to it - there are zombies around, more than a few, and it’s a lot of empty space that the Keepers could feasibly shoot and kill them in.

They make it into the lobby, stand there and pant for a bit - Liam leans against the wall and wipes his face with shaking hands.

“You okay?” Brett breathes anxiously.

Liam swallows. “Having a pretty rough time not checking out,” he says weakly.

“Come on,” Brett says, beginning to pull Liam along. “Upstairs. To the room. You can check out in there - even have a shower if you want to.”

As they head up the stairs - Liam drags his feet, and Fudge whines reluctantly - Brett realises they can’t stay put at the hospital. Not for long. The Keepers could very well know where they are by now - and anyway, they need to start moving towards the outskirts of the city.

His brain is foggy with the heat and the sudden absence of adrenaline. He keeps losing sight of that goal - of the goal of getting the fuck out of here and escaping the city in favour of the roads.

But what happens after that? After they get out? Another city? Another half-dozen cities, all potentially worse than the last? Longer periods of dissociation for Liam, with less clarity in between? And - travelling in summer sucks, sure. But travelling in winter is almost impossible, especially given that they’re headed east, where it snows, sometimes for months on end.

They had a month’s worth of supplies, but they’ve already been out here two weeks - circling the city helplessly like water dregs around a drain. They need to get out of here. Brett’s not good at maps like Liam is, but maybe once Liam’s rested… maybe then…

“I don’t think we should stay here much longer,” he says to Liam quietly.

Liam’s whole face crumbles into an expression of defeat. “Why?”

“We’ve been here a while. They might know-”

“We can’t move,” Liam interrupts, and Brett suddenly - belatedly - realises that he shouldn’t have brought this up here, not now, not with Liam already totally strung out and miserable.

“Okay, okay,” Brett reassures him quickly. “We won’t. Not yet. Alright?”

Liam looks freaked still, but a little calmer, and he continues up the stairs. Brett follows behind - they really can’t move right away anyway. They have to patch Owen up properly, and moving him is going to be an issue. Getting Owen into the hospital was hard enough.

Hayden is pacing when Brett pushes open the door to the ward. “Oh my God, you’re back,” she says, looking relieved.

“Yeah.” Brett holds the door and lets Liam sidle in with Fudge, then closes it. “We got the supplies we needed.”

“What happened?” she asks, watching as Liam slinks past everyone and sits down, quietly, on one of the beds. “You were gone for almost the whole day-”

“Shit got real,” Liam says succinctly.

Hayden looks to Brett, who shrugs. “What Liam said. Alright… let’s get Owen cleaned up.”

~*~

With Hayden’s help, he manages to stabilise and treat Owen’s wound.

Owen’s wary of letting him near it, and he almost refuses the IV Brett wants to use to bring his blood pressure back into a respectable range. Brett pretty much has to browbeat him into it, telling Owen that without a higher blood pressure, his risk of dying is much worse.

He’s kind of snappy while he works, bedside manner absent - mostly because he can see that Liam’s barely shifted on the bed. The most he’s moved is to lie back on it and pull a pillow over his face. He wants to be looking after Liam, not Owen - wants to get Liam showered, settled in front of their fire, and make sure he eats and drinks before heading off to sleep for the night. He feels almost guilty for thinking it; Liam’s not a toddler and probably doesn’t appreciate being treated like one.

He’s just about to go over to Liam, after washing his hands in the bathroom, when Hayden corners him. “Brett,” she whispers.

“Yeah?” he asks tiredly.

She looks anxious, he realises. “Look, it’s probably not my business,” she says. “But - what’s wrong with Liam?”

Brett’s spine snaps rigid all of a sudden; Hayden’s eyes flicker towards Liam, who’s lying still on the bed, having not moved for more than an hour. What’s wrong with Liam? Brett balks at the question - he doesn’t want to believe that there’s something wrong with Liam, that what he’s experiencing is inherently a flaw to his character, or that it might be permanent.

But he knows what she’s saying. “Wrong with him?” he repeats slowly.

Now, she narrows her eyes. “He hasn’t been like this before,” she says heatedly. “I know you’re hiding something from me - is he sick or something? Did he get bitten while you were out?”

“He hasn’t been bitten,” Brett hisses. “Keep your voice down - he’s got ears. He can hear you.”

Hayden softens a little. “What’s wrong with him?” she repeats, and it sounds pleading. “Brett, he’s - he’s just lying there-”

“Hayden, I wanna tell you,” he whispers back. “I really do. But it’s not my place to tell you. If he wants to, he will, and he can, okay? But - not me. I can’t.”

Hayden nods. “Alright,” she murmurs. “But - you’re taking care of him, right?”

“Always. I always do.”

“Okay. That’s good. Tell him, um, I’m making food. If he wants some… it’s there.”

Brett nods, then makes his way over to Liam carefully. Liam always gives signs that he wants to be left alone if Brett’s looking for them, even if they’re occasionally hard to spot.

He sits on the edge of the bed; Liam rolls, wriggles closer to him, and plants his face in Brett’s thigh before lifting a hand to touch the bandage on Brett’s arm.

“Is this okay?” he mumbles.

Brett smiles a little. “It’s fine, Li. Thanks.”

“And your head?”

“Hurts a little. Nothing Tylenol won’t take out though.”

Liam nods. Brett heaves a sigh as he looks around - Owen’s sleeping again, apparently feeling the effects of the pain medication Brett gave him; Vinnie’s sitting idly by the fire, not really doing anything; Hayden’s making some food and watching Vinnie warily.

Brett’s stomach turns. Vinnie’s clearly mentally ill, not dangerous. Still, Hayden’s eyeing him like distrustful dog might eye its handler; if push comes to shove and Brett has to tell her about Liam’s PTSD and anxiety - or, hell, Liam has to tell her - he has no idea what will happen. Only that it probably won’t be good for anyone involved.

Liam shifts and sighs; his breath is warm through the leg of Brett’s jeans. Brett starts rubbing his shoulders, gently, smiling a little when Liam gives a satisfied groan and begins to loosen up under the touch.

“Hayden’s making food,” Brett says softly. “You should eat something. Get clean. Maybe get some sleep.”

He’s surprised when Liam begins to lever himself upright, exhaustedly, like he can’t quite fathom the effort it takes. One side of his hair is sticking on end, and there are creases on his cheek from the pillow. He looks sleepy, not like he’s just spent the whole day battling a platter of mental health issues, zombies, and psychotic killers.

Liam eats some of the food Hayden makes, then drinks. Vinnie takes a bowl when it’s given to him, but he doesn’t really move to do anything. Brett thinks the firefight in Walmart pretty much sent Vinnie tailspinning into a mental breakdown - maybe his mental health was already fragile, like Liam’s, and not being monitored by Owen. Maybe Owen’s not sure how to deal with it.

Brett makes another bowl and heads to Owen’s bed, shakes his shoulder a little to wake him. “Hey,” he says when the guy stirs. “Food.”

Owen manages to sit a little, takes the bowl. “Thanks.”

Brett stays. Just in case. Liam seems alright - Fudge is sleeping on his feet, and Hayden’s chattering to him quietly. Everything will be fine after a good night’s sleep, Brett tells himself. Everything is gonna be fine.

“How is he?”

Brett looks at Owen. He nods at Liam, then taps his head.

 _Owen knows_ , Brett realises. _Owen knows Liam’s struggling._

“He’s doing better than he was before,” Brett says. “And that’s good.”

Owen nods, eats a forkful of food. “How long’s he been a headcase for?” he asks.

Brett feels a surge of anger at that; if Owen were standing, he’d probably pin him up against a wall, or at least face him down. “He’s not a fucking headcase,” he hisses. “Jesus, what the hell is wrong with you, dude? He’s sick, not deranged-”

“Problem?” Owen asks. “You seem touchy about it. I call Vin a headcase too you know. It isn’t personal.”

“That doesn’t make it okay!” Brett retorts angrily.

“Why didn’t you tell us he’s crazy?” Owen demands. “Feels like something we should’ve known-”

“He’s not crazy!” Brett snaps, barely refraining from yelling - and only because Liam’s in the room and doesn’t need to hear this fucking bullshit. “He’s fucking _traumatised!_ You would be too if you’d been through even half the shit he has!”

“We’ve all been through shit-”

“Just because you don’t feel things doesn’t mean other people don’t,” Brett mutters. “Vinnie and Liam clearly do. Oh, and if we’re gonna get on the topic of appropriate disclosure, how’s this - why didn’t you fucking tell us the Keepers have it in for you? Or that they were here, period? You didn’t think that was important for us to know?”

Owen’s silent, glaring down at his food.

Brett shifts forward. “Let me make myself perfectly clear,” he says lowly, and Owen looks up at him. “I don’t like you, Owen. I don’t trust you. I don’t buy the genial good-guy act you have going on. If I’d had it my way, I would’ve fucking left you - you _and_ Vinnie - in that warehouse and gone and found Liam, and we would’ve been better off for it. _Liam_ was the one who decided your lives were worth saving, maybe even at the cost of his own, and if he’d checked in with me first, I would’ve told him to fucking leave you behind.”

He can see that he’s finally gotten to Owen, and it feels so fucking good - to finally wipe clean the veneer of the big-brother facade and get to what Owen is underneath, which, Brett suspects, is some dumbass frat boy known for nothing more than playing mediocre college football. “I don’t think you are who you say you are,” Brett says coldly. “I don’t think you’re who you’re pretending to be. And I think you’re gonna slip. You’re gonna show us eventually. Or Vinnie will, given that he’s already cracked.”

He doesn’t get much further, not that he was going to - Owen’s fist swings out of nowhere and hits him square in the face, on his nose, and Brett yelps as he feels the pain bloom across it - along with an abrupt, severe flow of blood.

“Hey!” Liam yells, and he’s striding over. “Owen! The fuck’s wrong with you?”

Okay, Brett didn’t mean to incite violence or make Liam trust Owen less by proving he’s violent, but if it has that effect, he’ll definitely take it.

“You know your sugar daddy shoots his mouth off?” Owen asks Liam coldly.

“Sugar - oh, fuck you, Owen. He’s done more for you than he had to.”

“I didn’t ask him to!” Owen yells.

“We risked our fuckin’ lives for you!” Liam bellows. “We went out there today to get you fucking medicine! An IV so you wouldn’t go comatose on us and die! I don’t give a fuck what he said or what you think about our relationship - suck it up and fucking deal, because you owe him!”

“He’s four years older than you!” Owen shouts back.

“I don’t fucking care!” Liam says, and his voice seems almost calmer, in a terrifying way. “Who the fuck are you to judge, dude? I’m the one telling him what to do half the time! He’s not taking advantage of me-”

“Oh, as if-”

“I begged him to fuck me,” Liam says nastily. “I’ve sucked his dick more than once and I _love_ it. Does that bother you? That I’m gay? Worried I’m gonna make moves on you? I’m not. I’d rather fuck a cactus than go anywhere near your dick.”

“Liam!” Brett says. 

Liam looks around; Brett gets to his feet, wipes his nose, and begins to pull Liam away from Owen slowly. “That’s enough,” he says softly. “It doesn’t matter. I’m not offended.” 

“Well I am!” Liam snaps. “We’ve been looking after them for more than a week now - I nearly got caught and killed by the Keepers trying to distract the herd so you could save his life, Theo nearly fucking killed us both today, and the only thing he can think about is that I’m fucking gay!” 

“I don’t give a shit you’re gay!” Owen says, his voice still raised. “I give a shit about this fucking asshole takin’ advantage of you-” 

“For the last time! He is not taking advantage of me! He’s done more for me than anyone else in this godforsaken fucking hellscape ever has! And yeah - that includes you and Vin!” 

“We saved you, you ungrateful-” 

“You weren’t there!” Liam bellows. 

Owen falls silent, staring at them both. 

“You weren’t there when Garrett died,” Liam says, and his voice warbles like there’s something stuck in his throat. “You weren’t fucking there. I stayed in that sewer for a day with him, waiting for you to come back. And you never fucking did. You - you left me there with him, and I had to watch him die and turn and then I had to fucking shoot him.” 

“Liam, we said sorry for that,” Owen says pleadingly. “Is that why you’re still mad?” 

“No, I’m mad because you treated me like an adult then when I wasn’t and I - I needed someone to tell me what to do and look out for me, and you fell through, but now, when it suits you, I’m a kid. And I’m _not_ a kid. I’m not stupid. You act like I don’t know what I’m doing with Brett but I do. And if he was a woman, you wouldn’t give a shit.” 

Things are quiet for a moment; Liam’s breathing harshly, and Owen’s staring at him, looking stunned and a little guilty. 

“Just - fucking quit it,” Liam says. “Stop fighting. Stop assuming Brett’s taking advantage of me. He’s not. I’m not being manipulated into anything. And for fuck’s sake, let him fucking help you. You’re dumb as shit if you think anyone else has the medical knowledge.” 

“What about what he said to me?” 

“What about what he said to me?”

“Look, I’d say that I care, but I don’t,” Liam says tiredly. “Whatever he said doesn’t warrant you being a homophobic piece of shit. So there’s that.”

He turns to Brett. “Your nose okay?” he murmurs, reaching for Brett’s face.

Brett lets Liam’s fingers play across his jaw, barely restraining a sigh of satisfaction while he does. He likes it when Liam touches his face. “It’ll be fine,” he murmurs. “Just some blood.”

“Come shower,” Liam mumbles, tugging at his belt loops. “C'mon.”

Brett follows obediently, mostly just because he can tell Liam’s too tired to push him and fight him on it. He doesn’t need to make this day harder.

Liam steps into the shower first, after having stripped his clothes off. He’s still mottled with bruises, and he looks exhausted - even the cold water doesn’t seem to revitalise him the way it usually would.

Still, Liam mops Brett’s face gently to get rid of the blood from his nose, washes his hair - avoids the spot where the rock impacted Brett’s skull. “Someone needs to wake you up,” he mumbles. “Concussion.”

“I don’t have a concussion,” Brett says softly. “I’m alright.”

“You got knocked out-”

“Hayden can wake me up. You need to sleep. You’re wrecked.”

So they organise it - Hayden will wake Brett up in shifts. The night air is so hot and sticky that both he and Liam strip out of their shirts before even attempting to get into bed.

Just as Liam’s pulling back the covers to their bed - and yeah, they’d be cooler sleeping apart, but they probably wouldn’t sleep as well - Vinnie says, “Liam?”

Liam turns around, looking surprised. “Yeah?”

Vinnie blinks, then stands up. “You’re hurt,” he says softly, coming over to Liam and inspecting the bruises. “What happened to you?”

There’s a pause, like Liam’s not sure what to say - and nobody else does either, evidently - before he smiles a little and says, “I’m alright, Vin. Got into a fight. Nothing serious.”

Vinnie nods, and for a moment, Brett thinks they’ve got the guy back - he likes Vinnie a lot more than he likes Owen, and he’s momentarily relieved. Then Vinnie looks around, curiously, and says, “Where’s Lex?”

Liam opens his mouth, then closes it. He seems to be trying to think of something to say when Owen butts in, quickly, and says, “She went out, Vin.”

“By herself?” Vinnie asks worriedly.

“Nah man,” Owen hedges. “Nah, it’s cool. She’s with someone, okay? You should sleep.”

“What if she-”

“She’s fine, Vin,” Owen says pleadingly. “Get some rest.”

Vinnie goes and lies on one of the beds; Brett wants to demand that Owen tell them what’s going on right there and then, but Vinnie’s not catatonic anymore and Brett’s sure that it wouldn’t be good for him to hear. So instead, he gives Owen a long, hard look - one that promises they’ll be talking soon - and then heads off to sleep with Liam.

Liam’s exhausted. The moment he lies on the mattress - on his side, curled towards Brett - his eyes close and his breathing starts to deepen.

Brett reaches out, fits his hand against Liam’s cheek and jaw. Liam doesn’t even open his eyes; he’s already drifted into sleep, and Brett takes his time in stroking the light smatter of stubble across Liam’s jawbone with his thumb.

 _I wish we could go back_ , he thinks despairingly. _Back to River’s End. Just pretend the rest of the world didn’t exist, or that it at least wasn’t our problem._

He takes in the bruises still mottling Liam’s body and swallows thickly. His eyes sting, and his head is pounding. They’re lying on a cramped hospital bed, surrounded by dead, humid air, about a thousand miles from anywhere either of them would consider home, with no end in sight.

Brett closes his eyes and tries, desperately, to hold back tears. God, he didn’t want this. He wanted a cure, but not like this. He wanted to live, but not like this. Not by the skin of his teeth, or Liam’s. He wanted more for Liam than just surviving out here. He wanted more for Liam than what he had in Ashburton.

But things were easier then. Sure, it was just the two of them, but they had plenty of food and water, reliable shelter… the Keepers were an issue, but aside from that, it was all fine. Besides which Brett’s beginning to think the Keepers will be an issue no matter where they go.

He’s torn. He knows Liam will follow him anywhere. He’s proven that. Brett’s making decisions for both of them, and he’s not sure which is the right one - continuing on to the possibility of a cure and a normal life, or going back. Saying they couldn’t make it. Adapt to a new normal. Liam already had before they left.

He wants to wake Liam up and tell him that he’s sorry, for everything - every bad choice he’s made and hasn’t made yet - and then return home. But he can’t do that here, and he wouldn’t anyway with Liam finally resting peacefully.

He curls closer and starts to measure the time between Liam’s inhales, his hand on Liam’s neck, and - slowly but surely - drops off into sleep.

~*~

“Brett.”

He looks up.

Hayden’s kneeling at one of the windows, watching outside warily. It’s almost midday - they’re staying inside, mostly because it’s hot, but also because Liam, Owen, and Vinnie are all still crashed out asleep.

“What’s up?” he asks.

“I think we might have a problem,” she murmurs.

He joins her at the window. “What do you mean?”

“Watch.”

So he does. It takes him a while, but he sees it, finally - a blink of a light, rhythmic, from a few buildings away.

“A signal,” he realises aloud.

“Yeah.” She looks shaken. “They’re close.”

“Why are they signalling?” Brett murmurs uneasily. “If they know we’re here then why-”

“Does it matter?” Hayden asks. “We can’t stay. We’re too close. We need to find somewhere else-”

Brett looks around - to Owen, who’s still sleeping, Vinnie, who hasn’t stirred and isn’t paying attention to them, and at Liam - who’s curled up on his side and frowning in his sleep, like he’s realised Brett’s gone.

“We don’t have to move far,” Brett says. “Just far enough that we’re hard to find.”

“Okay.” Hayden looks scared. “How do you wanna do this?”

~*~

It takes them almost an hour to hatch a workable plan.

Liam’s awake now, and he bends over a map silently while Brett and Hayden talk specifics, his glasses on, carefully plotting a route through the narrower streets and buildings. The Keepers operate by flushing their targets into large, empty areas - it spooks them, Hayden says, and makes them easier to shoot at. So if they can stay, somehow, in back streets and alleyways, they might be able to use the remaining daylight to get to somewhere safer.

While Liam works on that, Hayden and Brett work on a way to get everyone out of the hospital safely - namely Owen. They decide to use a wheelchair for as long as they can, hoping not to saddle anyone with carrying his weight.

“Okay,” Liam says softly. “Okay, I think I’ve got something.”

It’s a long route, but every small street connects to another, and Liam’s managed to find them a path to a hotel building about a mile and a half away - emergency stops plotted out just in case. Liam thinks of everything. It’s how he survived as long as he did on his own. Liam doesn’t count on things going right - he counts on things going wrong, and he’s always prepared.

They hatch what Brett thinks is a pretty good plan. Vinnie will wheel Owen, Brett and Hayden will carry the vast majority of their stuff and keep a lookout, and Liam will go first because he knows the way.

He still looks exhausted. He’s not back to being one hundred percent, either - Brett can tell by the vague, disinterested look in his eyes that he’s at least partially elsewhere in his mind. Still, he agrees to go ahead and tells Brett he’s alright, and Liam’s past the point of lying to him where his mental health is concerned, so Brett believes him.

That doesn’t stop him from wigging the fuck out when Liam steps ahead of them with Fudge and begins to pick his way carefully through car wrecks and zombie corpses. He stays a few yards ahead - fifteen, maybe twenty - and doesn’t say anything.

Brett watches him, partially because he’s worried and partially because watching Liam pick his way through the destroyed landscape is kind of fascinating. It’s like the kid’s got a sixth sense for trails that will lead to dead-ends of insurmountable obstacles - Liam might be moving slowly, sure, but he hasn’t taken a single misstep.

“Is he okay?” Hayden asks Brett softly.

“He’s fine,” Brett replies, but he can hear the unmistakable bite of tension in his voice. “He’s tired.”

 _Tired_. A catch-all word for when Brett doesn’t feel like somehow summarising the dissociative episodes, anxiety, and PTSD Liam experiences. _He’s tired_. The phrase feels like a cop out, like he’s suggesting Liam could sleep it off.

The only sound, after that, is the occasional yelp or whine from Fudge, and Liam’s soft, wordless replies. They’re doing well, really, until they’re more than halfway there - Liam stops walking, turns in a circle, and squints.

“Wait here,” Brett says to Hayden, then jogs over to Liam. “What’s up?”

“There might be a way through over there,” Liam says, pointing, “but not if we can’t move that car.”

Brett nods, takes Liam in - he’s sweating a little, but not panting especially hard. If the car is in neutral, they might be able to push it.

“Let’s try,” Brett says.

The car isn’t in neutral. Having said that, they get lucky enough to find the keys in the ignition - enough people fled their cars on foot when the military stormed in that it’s actually fairly common - and so Liam turns the car on, at least enough to change the gearstick.

“We could drive it,” Brett says.

“Too noisy,” Liam replies tensely. “Fudge heard biters before. Don’t think they’re that close… but we shouldn’t push our luck.”

“Got it. Alright, you ready?”

“Ready as I’ll ever be.”

They manage to move the car enough to get Owen through in the wheelchair. As they pass, he turns to look at Liam.

“You doin’ okay, bud?”

“I’m alright,” Liam says easily, and Brett’s grateful - not for the first time - that Liam’s able to accept concern with relative ease and grace, instead of balking at the concept of someone checking on him.

They keep walking. Fudge is panting, and Liam stops to give him water more than once. Brett wonders how Liam’s bruising is holding up - he hasn’t complained, but that isn’t surprising. He might be fine with Brett knowing he’s injured, but anyone else? Not a chance.

“It’s around the corner,” Liam announces softly.

Brett looks around. No Keepers - they’ve caught the attention of a few zombies, but Liam dispatched them easily and silently. Now all that’s left to do is clear the hotel.

It’s not the biggest around, which is good. Still, Liam points out that if they’re going to be there a while, they need to check it thoroughly - all four floors.

Brett doesn’t want Liam cornered right now, potentially by a zombie. He tells Liam to stay with Vinnie and Owen, maybe check the lobby and see if he can find some food. Liam agrees, even if he does seem subdued.

He and Hayden, in the meantime, start clearing the hotel. It doesn’t take as long as Brett had thought it might - a lot of the rooms are locked and silent. Some are open, having had their keycard readers smashed by people attempting to get in or out. Taking all that into account, Brett and Hayden only kill fifteen or sixteen zombies between them, and they’re done in under an hour.

They settle on the second floor. Liam’s always saying not to go up, because it means getting cornered - but they’re worrying about people now, and being one level up from the entrance gives them time to hear and prepare for the Keepers if they come.

Vinnie and Owen end up in the room across the hall. Brett finds a nice one - not as destroyed as the others - for him and Liam. He’s not sure what Hayden plans on doing - she’s scrounging for food on the upper levels right now. Liam probably wouldn’t mind sharing with her, and Brett wouldn’t either.

“Second level?” Liam pants. He’s helping Owen up the stairs with Vinnie’s help.

“I know you hate stairs,” Brett says, smiling ruefully, “but it’ll give us an advantage if the Keepers turn up.”

Liam nods. Vinnie says nothing; Owen’s face is screwed up with pain.

They get Owen on a bed; Brett checks his wound while Liam makes sure the curtains are shut and the area secure, again, in case Brett missed a spot check.

“Thanks,” Owen croaks to Brett.

Brett nods. “No problem,” he says softly. “Let me know if you need anything, okay?” As much as he dislikes the guy, he feels kind of bad for what happened last night, and he doesn’t want Owen to suffer more than he has to. This is still the man who saved Liam’s life, even if that doesn’t excuse all the questionable shit he’s done since then.

He turns to Liam. “Our room’s this way,” he says, and Liam follows him unquestioningly.

They cross the hall. Liam looks both ways like it’s a street with cars on it before he finally steps across to join Brett.

“So.” Brett turns to Liam, arms spread. He feels inexplicably nervous. “Welcome to Casa Del Brett.”

Liam smiles a little as he enters the hotel room and drops his pack, along with their extra duffel. “It’s nice,” he says softly. “Seems safe.”

“I scoped out the area.” Brett takes Liam in carefully; he’s quiet, but not in his usual “I’m pissed off with the entire world and trying not to show it” way. It’s more like Liam’s dazed, or confused, or maybe even sick. Something about his expression suggests to Brett that he’s not entirely present, and Brett realises, in that moment, that that’s what’s making him nervous - Liam’s usually fine once he’s safe. Not this time.

Liam meets his eyes. Brett tries to smile. “Hungry?”

“A little.”

“Okay.” He opens his pack, watching out of the corner of his eye as Liam settles into one of the chairs at the tiny, two-person dining table, folding one leg beneath his body. Fudge sits at his feet - his ears are forward, and his tail is thumping against the floor softly. Liam’s alright. Fudge wouldn’t be wagging his tail if Liam wasn’t.

He brings over some dried meat, watching as Liam runs both hands through his hair, then gives his head a bit of a shake. His eyebrows are creased.

“Liam?” Brett asks softly.

Liam lifts his head, blinks. “Yeah?”

“You holding up okay?”

Liam smiles weakly. “That obvious, huh?”

Brett’s gut lurches. “No,” he rushes to say. “No, I just - I’m just asking, I-”

“It’s okay,” Liam interrupts him gently. “I get it. I know why you’re asking. I just need to sleep.”

Brett nods. “What Theo said,” he murmurs. “What he did. Do you…”

Liam shrugs a little. “He didn’t say anything that wasn’t true,” Liam replies softly. “And the truth is that something bad almost happened. Almost. I can deal with almost.” He rubs his face. “I dissociated,” he murmurs. “More than once. I’m missing huge chunks of time. Whole hours. Maybe more.”

Brett looks down at the table. Liam’s always been relatively confident in his ability to fight and win almost any combat situation he’s put in, and this time, he fell through, entirely due to circumstances outside his control.

Liam sighs. “That can’t happen again,” he murmurs, clearly distressed. “If I do that again, Brett, I…”

“It won’t happen again,” Brett says. “You-”

“It will happen again,” Liam interrupts. “We’re never going to be as safe as we were in River’s End, Brett, and I was dissociating there. It’s not going to stop out here. It’s going to get worse.” He motions at Brett’s arm, looking distressed. “I didn’t even see you get hurt.”

“We’ll go back,” Brett says immediately. “Fuck the rest of the world. We’ll go back to River’s End-”

“No,” Liam says. “You can’t give up a potential cure for me. And I don’t want you to anyway.” He shakes his head. “We’d bring the Keepers right down on top of River’s End, and you know as well as I do that most of the people there aren’t fighters. Apart from that… Brett, if we don’t go to DC and at least try to find a cure, there’s not gonna be a world for Lori or Savannah or Zack to grow up in, and I can’t live with that.”

“What about you?” Brett asks desperately. “Liam, you’re only eighteen-”

“Exactly,” Liam says. “And you’re only twenty one and if we give this up - if we throw it in and we don’t go to DC - this is going to be the rest of our lives. We’re always going to be struggling to survive - we’ll always be looking for food and water, constantly checking over our shoulders for the Keepers or, fuck, someone _worse_ , we’re going to be sick and rundown and eventually we’re gonna die way before we’re meant to. We haven’t lived long enough to resign ourselves or anyone else to that.”

Brett closes his eyes tiredly; Liam leans over the table, takes both his hands.

“How long have we waited?” he asks, and he sounds like he’s about to cry. “How many times have we talked about this? About a cure? How many times have we said, if only there was a way to fix it - a way to vaccinate it, or even reverse it. And now it’s here. And it’s you. It’s _you_ , Brett. You’re what we’ve been waiting for.”

Brett licks his lips; his eyes are stinging. “It might not work. It might-”

“We have to try.” Liam sounds like he’s begging now. “You don’t leave cancer untreated just because chemo might not work. Brett, we… if this thing works, if you’re the cure - we could stop running.”

 _We could stop running_. Brett opens his eyes, takes in how thoroughly exhausted Liam looks, realises, in that moment, that a cure means he’ll never have to fight again - a cure means Liam can get help and recover and heal. Do something other than survive, maybe.

“Okay,” he says.

Liam’s face crumples with relief. “Okay,” he whispers back, his voice breaking. “Okay.”

~*~

Brett takes watch.

Owen and Vinnie are sleeping in the room across the hall; Hayden ultimately joins him and Liam, seemingly feeling safer with them.

Liam sleeps. He’s tired and emotionally spent; Brett’s not surprised at all when Liam drops off right after eating and drinking, spread out on his back on the queen bed. Fudge joins him, rests his head on Liam’s stomach, but his eyes are open and his ears forward.

Hayden sleeps for a while, next to Liam, but she wakes up sometime around what feels like two in the morning and joins Brett at the table. Her eyes are soft and drowsy; she curls her legs towards her chest.

“Thanks,” Brett says.

She blinks at him sleepily. “What for?”

“He trusts you. He likes you.” Brett looks at Liam, who’s sleeping peacefully for once. “I just… I need to know someone else is watching out for him. Someone that isn’t me.”

“What about Owen and Vinnie?” she asks.

Brett shakes his head. “Vinnie’s… well, I dunno what Vinnie is, and Owen is concerned about him more than anything. And Liam… hasn’t been around people his own age for a really long time.”

“How old are you again?”

“Twenty one.”

She tilts her head. “Only three years.”

Brett smiles ruefully. “That’s fuckload of time when you’ve been to college and your boyfriend didn’t even finish his freshman year of high school,” he points out. “I love him to death. He’s everything to me. But I don’t always know how to talk to him or what to say. Sometimes we can’t bridge the gap between what he feels and what I know, just from life experience. But you can.”

Hayden just smiles a little. “You know,” she says, “when I met him, and we talked for a bit - he told me about you. That you were his boyfriend. And he looked… we were in a really terrible situation, but when he thought about you, it was like he got calm. Like he knew everything would be fine if we got back to you.”

Brett swallows. The whole reason they’re out here is because of him. He’s the catalyst here.

“He was right,” she admits. “I feel safe here too.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. You took me in. Liam told you I’d been with Theo… you gave me a chance anyway.” She shakes her head. “You didn’t have to. After what the Keepers almost did to him…”

“He told you that too?”

“We didn’t have much to do other than talk.”

Brett nods thoughtfully. “Thanks for bringing him back.”

She smiles. “Nothing would’ve stopped him. He has kind of a one-track mind when it comes to you.”

“He’s actually got a one-track mind when it comes to everything,” Brett admits. “It’s why he’s stayed alive so long, even when he was alone. He just thought about one thing at a time. Everyone else is out there scrambling to do twenty million things at once… not Liam. He breaks survival down into its most basic components.”

“Food, water, shelter,” Hayden says.

“Exactly. Then he worries about the rest later.” Brett shakes his head a little. “I distract him.”

“You keep him sane,” Hayden says.

“No. I’ve made him worse. You know how much shit he’s been through trying to protect me? And now, this, what we’re doing…” He sighs. “Can I tell you something?”

“Yeah,” she says, confused.

He rolls back his sleeve and holds out his arm, revealing his bite. Hayden doesn’t leap back or pull a gun the way Owen and Vinnie did; she inhales, sharply, and says, “What the hell is that?”

“I was bitten two or so months ago,” Brett says quietly. “Maybe longer, but the time kind of blurs together. Doctors where we come from saved my life. I have the antibodies to fight the infection. We’re going to Washington DC to look for-”

“A cure.” Her eyes are wide. “You’re looking for a cure.”

“Yeah. Liam didn’t have to come - I just… I hate being apart from him. But having him here, knowing he’s in trouble, because of me… sometimes I think it would’ve been better if I’d left him behind.”

“He would have found you,” Hayden says. “You know that. I haven’t even been around that long and I know that.”

Brett looks at Liam. He’s sleeping deeply, calmly. No nightmares tonight - he’s probably too tired for his brain to torture him.

“I like being alive,” he says. “And I’ve never wanted to die. Not once since this shit hit the fan have I ever considered death as an option. But seeing him out here, watching him get worse, on some half-assed, desperate mission that might not even pay off at the end of the day…” Brett rubs his face. “When I think of it like that, it might’ve been better if I’d just… died when I was bitten.”

He’s never said it aloud, and Hayden looks startled, then unsure, like she doesn’t quite know what she should say. There’s a long silence; Brett watches Liam’s chest rise and fall slowly.

“If you’d died,” Hayden says softly, “what do you think he would’ve done?”

“He would’ve stayed,” Brett says, frustrated. “In River’s End, where he had access to at least some psychological care and other people and a chance at a life, such as it is now.”

“He also might have been emotionally damaged beyond the point of recovery if you had died,” Hayden says. “Brett, I - I’ve lost people. I almost didn’t come back. And Liam… he might not have. Is that preferable? Would it even be living, if he was so tortured by you dying that he’d wind up incapable of human intimacy?”

Brett’s silent. She has a point. He just doesn’t wanna admit it. Not even to himself.

“This is our chance,” she says. “If there’s a cure in your blood… this is our chance. We’ll never have what we had before. But maybe we could have something better than what we do now. We could…” She shrugs, looking down at her hands. “We could do better,” she murmurs. “Be better than what everyone else has been since day zero.”

Brett looks to her. “Meaning?”

“Almost every adult I’ve met since the start of the apocalypse has tried to hurt me,” she says, “or use me, or kill me. But Liam - Liam was good. Nice. He let me go. He didn’t have to, and he probably shouldn’t have, but we need that now. There’s more than enough psychos and axe-murderers and God knows whatever else wandering around out there. But… maybe, if there was a cure, then the kids - the generations beneath us - maybe they could be salvaged, you know? We could teach them different.”

Brett swallows. “There are kids where we come from,” he says. “In River’s End. Most of them don’t even remember what life outside the walls is like. One of them was born there.”

“And they won’t know different unless we do the heavy lifting for them now,” Hayden points out. “Brett, if we do this now, if we pull this off… they won’t have to. They won’t need to grow up in fear. They might not need to know fear at all.”

“How likely do you think it is?” Brett asks. “That we make it to DC? That there are still scientists there who would know what to do with my blood? That the equipment still exists?”

She smiles. “Humans are perseverant,” she says. “We don’t have a lot of teeth or claws or fur to keep us warm, we’re born too early to be viable without constant care, we can’t swim like almost every other animal can at birth - but we’re here. We’ve got that going for us. We worked our way around all of those things. We can work our way around this too.”

He nods, feeling actually soothed about that. Hayden’s clearly thought this through, multiple times by the sound of it.

“You should sleep,” Hayden says. “I’ll keep watch till morning.”

“Liam-”

“Let him sleep.”

“He’s gonna be pissed when he wakes up.” Brett stands, cracks his back, and looks to Hayden, grateful that she’s willing to let Liam sleep off the remnants of an emotionally trying day. “Thanks, Hayden.”

She smiles. “No problem.”

“Hey,” he says. “What are your plans?”

She shrugs. “I didn’t have any,” she says. “I was just with Theo. Seemed as good a plan as any, really, and he was… well, not tolerable. But not as bad as some of the others. Defecting was kind of a last-minute choice.”

He nods. “You should come with us,” he says.

She looks surprised. “To DC?”

“Yeah. And after that, if it works out. Stick with us.”

Her eyes are glossy. “I’d really like that.”

“Can I ask you a favour, in that case?” he asks softly.

She nods.

“If something happens to me, make sure Liam gets back to River’s End,” he murmurs. “He’ll be safe there. So will you. I just don’t… I can’t think about him throwing his life away if I wasn’t in it. He’ll have something to live for there.”

“I will,” she says, and her voice breaks.

He’s tired. He pats her shoulder lightly as he heads to the bed, climbing onto it carefully. The moment Fudge feels his weight on the mattress, he moves to lie at the end of the bed, letting Brett move closer to Liam.

Liam stirs a little as Brett settles, then rolls to put his head on Brett’s shoulder. He’s clearly asleep - it’s too warm to really be snuggling - but Brett doesn’t push him away.

“Night, Brett,” Hayden says quietly.

“Night.”

~*~

When he wakes in the morning, Liam’s kneeling beside him on the bed, shirtless, damp, and looking curious.

Brett blinks his eyes open properly. “Hi,” he says sleepily.

“Hi.”

He takes Liam in, surprised and relieved to see that Liam’s eyes are bright and attentive, that he’s paying attention to Brett in the way he usually does when he’s healthy - with his entire body angled towards Brett’s, face soft with contemplation.

 _He’s back_ , Brett realises. _He’s okay. For now, anyway._

“You’re wet,” he notes, smiling a little.

Liam flops down next to him, pressing his blessedly cool skin into Brett’s. “Shower,” he said. “Water works here. I’m even clean. Look.” He shakes his head, and Brett splutters as he’s flicked with drops of water. “I’m blonde.”

“Impressive,” Brett says, laughing and running his hand through Liam’s wet hair. “Where’s Hayden?”

“She’s in there now.” Liam pins him with an accusatory look. “Neither of you woke me up.”

Brett shrugs. “You needed the sleep.”

“So did everyone else.”

“You needed it more.” Brett nudges Liam, seeing his expression, and says, “You’re a teenager. Aren’t you meant to sleep like twelve hours a day?”

His offhand joke works; Liam smiles. “Thanks.”

“Mm, don’t mention it.” Brett rolls, tucks his face into Liam’s chest, and presses a few clumsy kisses into his pectorals. “You smell good,” he mumbles.

“I used soap.” Liam sounds proud of that.

“There’s soap in there?”

“I don’t think it was anyone’s priority when shit got real, you know what I mean?”

Brett nods, opens his eyes again, and pulls away to look at Liam a little better. Liam’s nose scrunches in disappointment when Brett stops his licking of Liam’s chest, but he lets Brett take a good look at him.

The bruising has faded slightly. Brett uses a few fingers to probe at Liam’s hip and thigh, which were the areas most badly affected by the fall. Liam squirms a bit.

“Painful?” Brett asks softly.

“A little, yeah.”

Brett ducks his head and kisses Liam’s hip softly. Liam moves a bit beneath him, makes a vaguely unhappy noise.

“What’s up?” Brett asks.

“Just… travelling alone was so good,” Liam whines.

Brett chuckles lowly. “Yeah. Fair point.” He rolls onto his back, and Liam wriggles closer. “Listen,” he says. “I wanna get moving today. Leave the city.”

Liam nods vehemently. “Fuck this place,” he agrees, and Brett smiles - his Liam is back. “What about Hayden and Vin and Owen, though?”

“I asked Hayden if she wanted to come with us last night,” Brett says, and he’s happy to see the way Liam’s whole face lights up with the prospect of it. “Owen and Vinnie… we’ll talk to them. But I’m not sure they’ll wanna come, Li.”

“Why would they want to stay?” Liam asks, his eyebrows knit together in confusion.

Brett hesitates. “Vinnie’s… not good, Li.”

“I know that. Neither am I, just not in the same way.” Liam frowns. “Is this about that person you said he was looking for?”

“Lex. Yeah. Given that they’re not here and Owen won’t cough up who they are or why, and that Vinnie’s, you know… whatever it is he is - we might have trouble convincing him to leave.”

“Do you think this Lex person is even alive?” Liam asks softly.

Brett thinks about that for a moment. It’s hard to say. Although he’s leaning towards no, just based on the fact that Owen probably would’ve mentioned it as a reason for staying if they were. All he’s done is act shifty as fuck.

“Maybe,” he hedges. “If they are… I’d say Owen doesn’t know, at least.”

“Do you think they’ll wanna stick around?” Liam asks.

Brett tilts his head. “How would you feel about that?”

Liam looks vaguely uncomfortable - in the way he usually does when Brett asks a particularly probing question Liam doesn’t necessarily have an answer to. “Uh,” he says. “I mean… Owen tried to kill you. More than once.”

“But?” Brett prompts gently.

Liam sighs. “But they saved my life,” he murmurs. “More than once when I was a kid. I feel like I owe them.”

“You don’t owe them your life, Liam,” Brett reminds him softly. “If they put you at risk… we’re leaving.”

“Says who?”

“Says me and Hayden.”

“Great. What is this, a Protect Liam Squad?”

“That sounds like a great idea. I mean, your track record for staying safe is spotty at best, buddy.”

Liam flips him off, but he’s smiling a little as he goes to their stuff and starts to go through his pack, eventually producing some canned food. He settles back down on the bed, and he and Brett are just done eating out of it when Hayden appears from the bathroom, wrapped in a towel.

“You seem unconcerned with your lack of clothes,” Brett quips.

She shrugs. “You’re so focussed on one another I could walk past naked and you wouldn’t notice.”

“Brett’s bi,” Liam grins, and they both laugh as a blush spreads over her face.

“Oh. Oh. Um, I’m sorry, I just kind of-”

“It’s okay,” Brett chuckles. “I’m not looking.”

Still, they both look the other way as Hayden gets changed; she’s incredibly bony, even with her clothes on, and Brett doesn’t hesitate to direct her to their food. She won’t survive if she doesn’t have nutrition, and he’s surprised she’s managed to make it this far. She must be tough - at least as tough as Liam.

They sit for a while, talking softly, until they hear movement across the hall. Hayden stands up.

“I’ll take them some food,” she offers, and that’s when Brett remembers that Vinnie and Owen are still with them, and not just vague ideas in the back of his head.

She goes. Liam looks to Brett. His eyes - reduced to wide circles of blue and black pinprick pupils in the sunlight - are questioning.

“We need to confront them,” Brett agrees softly. “About whoever Lex is. About how the Keepers knew they were here and why they have it in for them personally. And then we need to get the fuck out of here. Sound good?”

Liam nods. “I’m not good at talking,” he says.

“I know. You just have to be there. Owen doesn’t like me, but he likes you, Liam. He’ll listen to you.”

Liam gnaws on his lip. “Brett,” he says softly. “After… after we ask them… even if everything goes according to plan, then what? We still need to go to DC. But they seem like they’re here for a reason, and I don’t think they’ll leave.”

Brett pauses. “Do you want to help them do whatever they’re doing?”

“I feel like I owe them. I don’t want to but-”

“Liam,” Brett whispers, shuffling closer. “You nearly gave up your life to the herd and then the Keepers to keep them safe. You don’t owe them anymore.”

“I did that for you,” Liam says. “Not them.”

 _For you. Not for them_. But this is the problem, isn’t it? That Liam does so much for him. Liam does so much for him, to protect him, without even thinking of himself. Liam puts his life and mental health at risk to protect Brett, and it’s a trend that will continue. Brett doesn’t want it to.

“You don’t owe me either,” he says weakly. “You don’t have to-”

“I didn’t do it ‘cause I owe you,” Liam says, and then he smiles. “If I could get a tattoo it would be that. I say it that often now.”

Brett rubs his face. “So?” he asks. “What’s the gameplan?”

“You’re better at planning than me,” Liam says. “But… I guess we ask them straight up what they’re doing here and why. Find out who Lex is. If she’s alive… or real… we could offer to help them find her.”

“Liam-”

“If she’s a real person and she’s in trouble, Brett-”

“Liam,” Brett interrupts softly. “If she’s a real person who’s still alive and in trouble, don’t you think Owen would’ve told us at least that by now? He placates Vinnie whenever it comes up.”

Liam looks uneasy. “I guess… but…”

Brett waits, but Liam doesn’t finish. “What is it?” he prods gently.

“Hayden said something to me,” Liam says. “When we first met? Something about me assuming Owen and Vin were on my side because they were three years ago. She pointed out that just because they haven’t hurt me yet doesn’t mean they’re good guys. They might be worse than the Keepers and we’d never know.”

“Do you think that’s true?” Brett asks warily.

“No,” Liam says, too quickly to be truthful.

“Liam…”

“It stuck with me,” Liam says. “Because they have been lying to us. And why would they unless it’s something big?”

“Well, they aren’t with the Keepers, that’s for damn sure, because they’re trying to fucking kill us all.”

“What if they were?” Liam asks softly.

Brett looks at him. “What do you mean?”

“What if they used to be and they… I dunno, got kicked out or whatever?”

“Do you get kicked out of a murderous cannibal paedophile ring? Like, seriously, what kind of fucked up shit do you have to do to deserve that?”

“I dunno,” Liam says uneasily. “I’m probably wrong.”

“Yeah,” Brett says slowly. “Yeah, maybe.”

But the seed is in his mind now, and it’s all he can think about as he heads off to shower - that whatever Owen and Vinnie are hiding has to be big, and that it’s probably bad.

He just hopes it isn’t somehow tied to a possible alliance with the Keepers. He doesn’t want to kill anyone. But if he finds out Liam’s old friends were with them willingly, before…

He shakes the thought off. He’ll cross that bridge when he gets to it. For now, he needs to shower and work out what they’re going to say when they confront Owen and Vinnie.

_What are you guys doing here?_

_Why do you hang around when the Keepers are here and want you dead?_

_Who’s Lex?_

_What aren’t you telling us?_


	30. Chapter Thirty - 0.01 Percent

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> okay guys this chapter is one hell of a fucking ride so here are the applicable warnings: **mentions of rape, cannibalism, and violence; extreme dissociative episodes and panic attacks.**
> 
> and if that doesn't sound all that fun (it isn't) there's a smut scene in there somewhere. read safe and enjoy <3

**Chapter Thirty - 0.01 Percent**

**Liam's P.O.V**

They have to ask Owen and Vinnie what the fuck is going on.

Liam hasn’t wanted to. He’s curious, sure, but he hasn’t wanted to ask for fear that he might learn something he’s not exactly ready to. And really, that could be a plethora of things.

He’s changed his mind now though. Even if he isn’t ready or it hurts or it means Owen and Vinnie aren’t the good guys, they have to know. The lack of honesty and disclosure between both groups has been the number one reason they’ve been fighting and at a disadvantage to the Keepers.

It sucks. After Garrett and before Brett, when Liam was alone, he used to dream that Owen and Vinnie would somehow find him in Ashburton and get him out of there. That everything would be fine and they’d look out for him like they always had. And he was so fucking happy to run into them, to find them - to know they were alive, okay, that they _did_ try to go back for him, even if it was just to put his corpse down…

And now, he wishes he hadn’t met them again. Everything’s completely fucked and Liam doesn’t see how they’re gonna get out of this city alive or okay when Owen and Vinnie are hiding things from them and the Keepers are out for blood. There are too many things going on at once for him to be able to make a good judgment; Owen needs better healthcare, Brett and Liam need to get to DC, Vinnie wants to stay for this Lex person…

He’d always wondered how well-established groups ending up falling to herds or rival survivors, especially when it seemed to easy for him to survive in Ashburton on his own. Now he gets it; when he was on his own, he was only looking out for himself. His end goal was survival. Food and water. That was all he had to worry about.

It got riskier when Brett was added to the mix, because Brett had different priorities - get out of Ashburton, through the tunnels, to Oakridge. And before that - when Brett got sick and Liam’s routine was derailed just trying to keep him alive, and he was forced to throw caution to the wind and go out into a snowstorm to find medicine. He gets it now - big groups mean conflicting priorities and interests.

His brain drags him back to the snowstorm. Battling through the wind and the cold, against his better judgment - already tired from previous injuries and the general effort of surviving. He remembers it vividly - the wind whipping across the landscape, almost unrecognisable under a thick, silent blanket of snow; the ominous blue tinge to his surroundings. The trip there was enough to leave him exhausted - enough to get the better of him in the fight against Doug.

He shivers weakly. Doug. His worst nightmare has a name now. It’s true that he doesn’t remember much of what Theo said before, in the apartment, with Brett in the bathtub, but he remembers that. Right after Doug was mentioned, Liam started slipping, fast, so fast he barely had time to feel afraid about it. The next clear memory he has is of Brett begging him to get up and move. He knows he hit Theo, because Brett told him… but he doesn’t remember doing it.

“Liam?”

He looks up. Brett’s standing near the bed, stepping into his jeans. His chest and hair are still damp from a quick shower.

“Yeah,” he says, and he sounds surprised. He hates it when his voice comes out like that - meek and uncertain, like he’s not sure why he’s being spoken to.

Brett hesitates for a moment. “You alright?”

They both know he’s not. But what’s Brett supposed to ask him? _On a scale of one to ten, how close are you to having a complete mental breakdown?_ Brett wouldn’t ever ask him that and Liam wouldn’t be able to answer properly anyway.

He tries to smile. “At the moment.”

Brett nods, but he seems less hesitant and he crosses the room in a few swift strides, sinking onto the mattress next to Liam and looking at him thoughtfully for a moment. Not assessing, just… contemplative.

“Do you remember when we met?” Brett asks.

Liam won’t ever forget it. His life, it feels like, has been split into a series of nonsensical, disjointed chapters, marked by different stages of injury, grief, and healing. There was Before the fall, and Liam used to think there was an After, too. After his stepdad rushed him out through the fire escape, After they realised the dead were coming back, After all human resistance failed and the few human beings that were left were reduced to nothing more than horrifically, painfully self-aware cattle, shepherded by hoards of biters.

That wasn’t his After, even though there have been lots of those since that day. There was Before the fall, and then After Garrett. The time between Garrett and Brett, in his mind, yawns gaping wide like an abyss; it’s unclear, really, what he did or how he survived.

He knows this: his life now is more clearly defined by the times Brett has been in it. Before Brett, After Brett. Before River’s End, After. Before Brett got bitten and infected and After. Brett is the only marker in Liam’s life that makes any sense to him; Brett is his only constant. The only thing that makes sense.

“I remember,” he says, realising Brett’s waiting on his response. “Yeah.”

“What do you remember about it?”

Truth be told, not a lot; it took almost a week for Liam to come out of survival mode enough to register Brett as an object of permanence in his life. What Liam does remember is this - Brett, pulling him out of the ice when he fell through it. Keeping him warm. Not pushing him away when Liam acted out, or when Liam told Brett he was gay. Is gay. It didn’t matter; it never even came up again until…

Liam closes his eyes; his side twinges. God, but he does remember that pain - that awful, consuming pain, the kind that’s exhausting just from its sheer presence. He doesn’t remember getting stabbed, but he does remember slowly bleeding out, realising he was probably going to die, realising after that that he wasn’t ready to go. He thought before he had been, but after Brett…

More befores and afters. Before Brett, he was ready to die. After, it wasn’t an option.

“You stayed,” he says. “That’s what I remember most. You stayed.”

Brett smiles. He doesn’t seem to mind that Liam’s taking longer than usual to respond to him. “And I’m still here now.”

“I know,” Liam says, and he does; still, hearing it soothes something inside him he didn’t know was anxious, and he relaxes. “How’s your arm?”

“It’s okay. Stings a bit.” Brett tilts his head. “You doing okay?”

Liam takes a deep breath, wipes his hands on his jeans. “Yeah.” He thinks for a moment; he’s been out of it the last day or so. Distant. “I know I’ve been… I dunno. I was gone for a while yesterday. With Theo. But yeah, I’m doing better today.”

Brett tilts his head, puts his forehead against Liam’s. “I love you,” he murmurs. “One day we’re gonna be able to settle somewhere. For good.”

Liam’s throat tightens. He wants that so badly. Part of him wants to turn back. But he meant what he said before - he wants better than this. More than living by the skin of his teeth. To help other people. Brett’s the cure, and Liam’s not sure why that surprises him. Brett’s always been the answer to him. Why should it be any different for others?

Brett’s hand wraps around the back of his neck. “Are you okay to confront Owen and Vinnie?” he whispers.

“Brett, I’m okay, I-”

“I’m just - I’m so worried for you. About you. I’m sorry, I know it’s not-”

“Don’t be sorry. I know. Thank you. Thank you for caring enough to worry.” With that, Liam gives him a quick kiss and stands up, because if they stay on the bed Liam can’t guarantee he’s not going to take it further and beg Brett to fuck him with people in the next room; sex with Brett is great for a multitude of reasons, the biggest being… well, Liam’s started to associate physical intimacy with a feeling of safety, and he’s craving that right now.

Brett stands with him. “Ready?”

“Never, but let’s do it.”

“I’ll talk. You just scowl. You’re good at that.”

“Look mean. Intimidate the 6'5” linebacker. Sure sure.“

They head next door. Owen’s up and walking, which is pretty good to see - Vinnie’s in the corner. Liam’s pretty sure Hayden’s scoping out the area, maybe other floors of the hotel.

"Hey,” Brett says. “How’s the leg?”

“’S good,” Owen confirms. “Can walk at least.”

“That’s good.”

Liam knows he’s supposed to let Brett do the talking, but everyone’s looking and acting awkward as fuck. “You know,” he says, “we never asked why you guys are here.”

Owen almost immediately looks alarmed. “Why we’re here?”

“Yeah. Why’d you move on out of Cali?” Liam asks. “Wasn’t so bad towards the end.” He gestures. “This place is a ghost town. No people. No groups-”

“Passing through,” Owen says quickly, as Vinnie opens his mouth. He frowns, then closes it.

That’s definitely weird. “Passing through?” Brett asks. “But… you guys haven’t even made an attempt to move on from here since we got here. And, dude - the Keepers. They seem hellbent on killing you guys. There are safer places-”

“Lex,” Vinnie says suddenly, and Owen’s head whips around.

“Lex?” Brett asks quickly. “What about her?”

“She’s looking for something,” Vinnie says earnestly. “We’re just waiting for her to be done. Then we’re moving on.”

“… To where?” Liam asks slowly.

“Look, we didn’t, uh, have a plan,” Owen says uncomfortably. “When you guys turned up we figured we might join up with you. When, uh, Lex is… done looking.” The last part is addressed to Vinnie, who looks satisfied.

“Okay,” Liam says. “Let’s go find Lex then. We can get the fuck out of here.”

“Guys?”

It’s Hayden; she’s returned from looking around. “I can’t see any signs of the Keepers,” she says. “If we’re gonna move it should really be today. They won’t be expecting it.”

Liam turns to Owen. “Let’s go get Lex then,” he says quietly.

“No,” Owen says. “Not right now.”

Liam steps forward - and Owen whips a gun out of his pants, pointing it not at him, but at Brett.

The adrenaline dump is incredible; Liam’s crossbow is in his hands before he registers reaching for it, and he lines his body up between Owen and Brett, despite Brett’s protests. That Owen would go for Brett, knowing that Brett’s more important to Liam than his own life…

“Guys?” Hayden squeaks.

“Tell me where she is,” Liam snarls.

Owen’s still pointing the gun at Brett. “Liam,” he warns. “If I count to five and you’re still pointing my own damn crossbow at me-”

“Count all you fuckin’ want,” Liam growls, stepping to the side to adjust for Owen’s leaning a little to see Brett. “I’m not gonna count at all.”

There’s a long pause.

“Is this about Lex?” Vinnie asks Owen.

“Vinnie, shut the fuck up.”

“I swear to God,” Liam says. “If you don’t tell me what the fuck is going on I’m gonna start shooting holes in you. And I’m enough of a headcase to do it.”

Owen lowers his gun a little. “You heard that.”

“I’m not fucking deaf,” Liam snaps. “But stop changing the subject, dude. Tell me what you did to her. Or where she is, or what happened.” He tilts his head. “If you didn’t do anything, you have nothing to hide, right? Don’t need to be shady about it.”

“She was with the Keepers.”

Liam blinks, looks to Vinnie. He seems almost surprised to see that they’re talking about this. He’s not catatonic anymore, sure, but he’s definitely repressing a lot of memories and not functioning in the way he really should be. Not that Liam can talk.

“What?” Brett asks.

“Lex.” Vinnie looks between them. “She was with the Keepers. We saved her.”

“Vin,” Owen pleads. “Don’t-”

“Saved her?” Liam asks slowly.

“Yeah.” Vinnie nods vigorously. “Yeah, we saved her, and she came with us. You could just ask her when she gets back from scouting the area. She’ll tell you.”

Liam looks at Owen, really pins him, until Owen’s shoulders slump and he puts the gun down. Liam doesn’t withdraw his; he keeps it raised and perfectly steady. For once, his nerves aren’t letting him down.

“I’ll tell you,” he says. “But not here. Not like this.”

Not like this. With Vinnie watching. Liam never wants to get to the point where Brett has to not talk around him or include him in decision making because he’s too fucked up to deal with reality. His stomach turns just thinking about it. He needs Brett, and he knows Brett won’t leave him - but Brett needs him too. To hunt, to go the hard yards where he can’t. Brett needs him, and Liam can’t let his mental health get in the way of being there for him.

_Brett needs me. I can’t fuck up. I can’t freeze._

Somehow, it doesn’t bolster him. In fact, it makes everything seem worse.

~*~

They leave Hayden with Vinnie and head out into the hallway.

When they get out there - Owen’s limping and still looks kinda pale - they close the door and move down a little. Liam stays between Brett and Owen. This he can do.

“Look,” Owen says softly. “She was real, okay? She was. And Vinnie’s telling the truth. We saved her.”

“So?” Brett asks. “Why not just tell us that? And why’re you saying "was”, past-tense?“

"She’s dead, okay?” Owen snaps. “Look, I… I’m just trying to do what you’re trying to do, man. I’m tryna take care of him. He’s sick. He’s my buddy and he’s sick.” He looks at Liam, then at Brett. “You’d do the same for him.”

“Your care looks a lot like denial,” Brett says.

“Look, he doesn’t remember she’s dead,” Owen says. “He like - he blocks it out, dude. Everything else that happens sticks with him but he blocks that part out.”

“Why?” Liam asks slowly. “Why that part?”

“You remember Jess?” Owen asks, and Liam nods. Jess was the girl Vinnie was infatuated with, right at the start of all this shit. “She looked so much like Jess, dude. So we saved her from the Keepers, right? And she came with us for a bit. And then she decided it was too hard. She liked how things were with them. She tried to go back.”

“Tried?” Brett asks. Liam feels cold all over. Something about that just doesn’t add up to him… something about being able to leave, willingly, and then go back without fearing for her life… it doesn’t make sense.

“Vinnie tried to stop her because he wanted her to stay,” Owen says. “I don’t know what happened. But when I woke up she had a knife at his throat and I - I fuckin’ panicked, dude. I just-”

“You killed her,” Brett says.

“What was I supposed to do?” Owen hisses. “Let her kill him?”

“You’re saying that you - you, Owen, you’re built like a fuckin’ linebacker on steroids - couldn’t knock this tiny girl on her ass without having to - to do whatever it is you did to her?” Brett demands.

“I didn’t think!” Owen whispers, and he sounds panicked. “I didn’t mean to kill her, I was trying to shoot her shoulder and she moved and it - it hit her chest and she bled out.”

“And Vinnie blocked it out,” Liam says numbly.

“So why does he keep looking for her?” Brett asks.

There’s a long silence. Owen looks at his feet.

“You didn’t put her down,” Liam realises slowly. “You - she’s still… alive. Undead. Whatever.”

“Yeah,” Owen says softly. “Vinnie was freaking. I couldn’t get him to eat or move so I just kind of - I chained her up and-”

“Christ,” Brett says, sounding disgusted. “You killed the poor chick for trying to escape you guys and now you’ve got her body chained up somewhere? As what? Wank material? What does Vinnie - Jesus Christ, Owen, what the _fuck?”_

“He just - he brushes her hair sometimes,” Owen says desperately. “And it’s the only thing that keeps him even a little sane so-”

Liam wanders away a few feet, dazedly, finds a trashcan, and pukes into it violently. His eyes water, and he hears Fudge bark anxiously before rushing to his side. Brett’s coming too by the sounds of it. Moments later, he feels Brett’s hand on his back.

“Liam?” he murmurs.

Liam straightens up, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand shakily; Brett passes him a bottle of water and waits for him to rinse his mouth, spit, and then drink.

“You alright?” he asks quietly.

“We can’t leave her like that,” Liam says, surprised when his voice breaks.

“Jesus Christ, Li,” Owen snaps. “You know how hard it was for you to put Garrett down-”

“But I did it!” Liam says. “Because he didn’t want to come back - because nobody wants to come back, Owen! Not like that! You can’t leave her like that and you can’t - you can’t use her as a prop for Vinnie’s sanity, she was a person, you can’t fucking leave her like that-”

“Besides which,” Brett says softly, “this isn’t helping Vinnie.”

“He’s-”

“Catatonic half the time and half out of his mind for the rest,” Brett says. “Letting him believe it’s her is dangerous for all of us, but especially him. This isn’t helping him-”

“I’ve tried helping him!” Owen yells. “I’ve fuckin’ tried everything! Talking him down, meds-”

“That’s what the Lexapro was for,” Brett interrupts. “Wasn’t it? On the shopping list you gave us? You wanted to see if the Lexapro would help him.”

“I thought it might make him, I dunno, fucking stable enough that I could - that I could tell him the truth.”

Brett rubs his face. “Lexapro is used to treat anxiety,” he says softly. “Not PTSD.”

“He doesn’t _have_ PTSD-”

“He does,” Brett says. “Trust me.”

“Liam has PTSD and he isn’t like Vinnie!”

“My God, it’s almost like two completely different people with completely different issues are presenting a poorly understood mental illness differently! Who’d have thought?”

“Would you both shut up?” Liam asks.

They turn to him, obviously having forgotten that he’s actually standing there in front of them. He feels a little shaky, but he continues to speak. “It doesn’t matter,” he says. “It doesn’t matter what Vinnie’s got or what I have. You need to put her down.”

“Liam-”

“Go put her down,” Liam says. “Or I will.”

There’s a long, pregnant pause. Owen looks livid.

“Fine,” he says. “But we don’t tell Vin it was us and he’s not coming. He stays with Hayden. Got it?”

“Fine,” Liam snaps. He just wants this done. Put the poor girl to rest and then…

And then what?

~*~

Owen’s walking again, but slowly, and it takes them almost an hour to reach the spot.

The first thing Liam notes is the burnt-out campfire on the ground and the half-tent constructed out of plastic tarp and the side of a delivery van. Yeah, this was definitely a campsite… whether it was a campsite before or after Lex died, he’ll never know.

“She’s in there,” Owen says, heading to the doors. “I’ll do it.”

Liam watches him go suspiciously. But sure enough, a few seconds after the van door opens, he hears hissing and grunting, and then the sound of a knife going through a skull.

It’s done. Just like that. And he made it look so easy…

Owen climbs out. “Happy now?” he asks dully.

“Sure,” Brett says.

“We should stage a scene or something,” Owen says. “Vinnie’s gonna wanna come back here at some point. When he does he needs to think it was random raiders, not us.” With that, he turns to the campsite and begins to rustle around.

Liam watches for a while, unaware of Brett climbing into the van, then out again a few minutes later. He’s off in his own little world, feeling inexplicably irritable and perplexed, when Brett returns to him.

“Liam,” he says softly.

Liam turns to him - and Brett’s face is shrouded in clouds and uncertainty. Something is wrong. Something is really wrong, and Brett - Brett looks sympathetic, worried-

“What?” Liam asks slowly.

Brett takes his arm gently, moves him away a little. “Liam,” he murmurs. “Look, I just took a look at Lex’s body. I’m not a doctor, but - Owen said he shot her, right?”

“Right,” Liam agrees, frazzled. “What’s the problem?”

“She doesn’t have any bullet wounds on her,” Brett says. “The bones in her neck… they’re broken. She wasn’t shot. She had her neck snapped.”

Liam opens his mouth, closes it. His stomach turns; for one terrifying moment, he thinks he’s going to be physically sick, again, twice in as many days. Brett puts a hand on his hip, tucks his thumb under the waistband of Liam’s jeans, and rubs there soothingly.

“Snapped?” he hears his own voice asking.

“I think that’s what killed her, yeah.”

Liam thought he’d be angry - I.E.D-angry, enough to start smashing up cars and walls and people and whatever else happened to stand in his way. He’s ready to welcome the ear-ringing, red cloud of fury that usually overcomes him, but it never arrives; in its place, a cold, terrifying calm settles into his bones.

“Owen lied.” He isn’t asking; it’s a statement.

“I think so,” Brett says nervously. “I don’t know why but-”

“I do,” Liam hisses, shouldering his crossbow and reaching for the gun he has holstered at his thigh. “Because without us their sorry asses have no fucking chance of leaving this city. We’re their ticket out and they don’t care if we die in the process.” He looks around, but he’s lost sight of Owen in his daydreaming. “Where is he?”

“Liam-”

“Where the fuck is he, Brett?”

“Near the van.” Brett’s whispering; he doesn’t want to tell Liam.

Liam yanks his gun out and strides over to the van, finally spotting Owen crouched by the side. Owen doesn’t even turn around as he approaches; he’s not expecting anyone, much less Liam, to get the jump on him.

Liam clicks the safety off the gun and holds it to Owen’s head, which is around about the time he freezes in place.

“You lied,” he snarls. “Don’t bother saying you didn’t. I know you did. Now stand up, turn around, and tell me what actually happened before I wipe you off the face of the fucking earth.”

There’s a long pause. “Lex,” he begins.

“I’m not fucking around!” Liam bellows, and he loses his temper enough to kick Owen’s legs out and watch as he falls flat on his face, then turns over to look at Liam, wide-eyed and shocked. Liam cocks the gun again.

“She had her neck snapped,” Liam hisses. “No bullet holes.”

“What’s his face tell you that?” Owen breathes, darting a glance at Brett.

“Don’t fuckin’ look at him,” Liam snarls, moving to keep Brett behind him. “He’s got nothin’ to do with it.”

“He has everything-”

“If you hurt him, I’m gonna make sure you die slowly,” Liam says.

“Liam,” Brett rebukes, sounding shocked. Liam will feel the sting of Brett thinking he’s serious later; for now, it works on Owen, and he shuts up and stares at Liam with fear - and what looks like growing malice and anger.

“You won’t,” he says.

“Yeah? Try me.”

“You won’t,” Owen says. “‘Cause you wouldn’t do it to Vin and you’d have to explain to him.”

He’s got Liam there, and they both know it. Owen stands up slowly, hands out; Liam keeps the gun trained on him and keeps his own body slotted neatly and unfailingly between Owen and Brett. Owen hates Brett; in a fight between them, Brett will lose.

“We saved your fucking life,” Liam spits. “Wouldn’t have done it if we’d known.”

“Now what?” Owen challenges. “You kill me? You don’t even have proof it was me who did it.”

They don’t, but God, Liam knows, he knows deep down in his gut - who else could it have been? Why would they chain up some random walker girl? They wouldn’t, so it had to have been them, and there’s no way that strangulation was self-defence in this case, because Owen’s six foot five and built like a linebacker and could probably just sit on someone to subdue them-

“You aren’t coming with us,” Brett says, and Owen’s head whips up.

“What?”

“Consider our offer to get you out of the city rescinded,” Brett says coldly. “Even if you didn’t do it, we’ve had enough of the lies. If this was all innocent enough like you said it was, there wouldn’t have been a need for it. You were lying right from the start.”

“For Vinnie-”

“It doesn’t matter,” Brett cuts in. “You aren’t coming with us.”

“What about Vin?” Owen challenges.

Brett and Liam share a glance - that’s all it takes, really, just a split second of looking away before Liam hears Owen move, Brett yells, the gun goes off, and Liam’s slammed into the ground so hard he sees stars in his eyes.

There’s another gunshot, another yell, and then the sound of scrabbling feet - he’s just beginning to sit up when he notices Brett kneeling down next to him, wide-eyed with worry. In the distance, Owen’s form is retreating.

“You okay?” Brett asks. “Liam?”

“Fine,” Liam groans. “Help me up. What-”

Brett helps him to his feet, jerking him so hard he almost bounces upright. “Gunshot startled him,” Brett says gravely. “I managed to get hold of it. I hit him, but in the shoulder. He’s making a break for it now.”

Liam hears groaning - walkers, dozens of them, coming their way.

“We made too much noise,” he says, holstering the gun and grabbing Brett’s hand. “We have to go-”

“Owen’s gonna come after us now,” Brett warns. “We still have Vinnie and he’s gonna want his stuff. We have to leave the city, Liam.”

“Alright, all the more reason to move faster then. Let’s go.”

~*~

“We need to ask Vinnie.”

Liam turns to Brett; he’s exhausted and his head is pounding viciously from where he hit it. No concussion, though, from what he can tell. “Huh?” he asks tiredly.

“We need to ask Vinnie what happened,” Brett clarifies. “He might…”

“Vinnie doesn’t know the difference between a mop and a bucket right now,” Liam croaks.

Brett hands him a bottle of water; Liam drinks thirstily, arching up into Brett’s hand when it lands on the back of his neck comfortingly. “Can’t hurt,” Brett replies softly. “Either way, we’ve still got a few hours of daylight left. We’re leaving today.”

“What if-”

“We’re leaving,” Brett says fiercely. “I’m not watching you suffer in this fucking hellhole anymore. We’re going. We’re gonna find a working RV or car or something, we’re gonna get Hayden and Fudge, we’re gonna find out what really happened from Vinnie if we can, and then we’re fucking leaving. We spent too much time here. We got sidetracked. Probably on purpose. Now we’re not and we’re going while we still can.”

Liam nods, swallowing thickly. His chest already feels a little looser, and his head is clearer - they have a goal and Brett’s calling the shots. All Liam has to do is jump through the hoops, and he can do that. He’s good at that.

“Okay,” he says.

Brett looks surprised. “Okay?”

“Okay.”

Brett nods, caps the water, and begins heading back. Liam’s just starting to notice that he’s only eating or drinking when Brett physically hands him something; it hasn’t even been striking his mind that he needs to actually take care of himself and eat for once. He hasn’t felt hungry.

“You okay?” Brett asks.

“Yeah.” Truthfully, he’s feeling all sorts of bruised and battered - his head hurts, his injured hand is throbbing, and the left side of his body is still one gigantic bruise. He kind of wants to lie down and rest for a year. But there’s nothing they can do, and so he settles for a quick “yes”.

“You know, it kind of makes sense in hindsight,” Brett says.

“What does?”

“How they acted. They knew where the Keepers had been moving. What parts of the city they were in. The hair-trigger Owen had where I was concerned - I dunno, I’m sure he was genuinely just a prick about it, but he had to have seen shit with them. Just because they were cannibals doesn’t mean he endorsed the paedophilia or slave trade.”

“He worked with them,” Liam says. “He endorsed it.”

“He might not have _believed_ in it-”

“And that does fuck all for the people he hurt while he was doing it anyway,” Liam says.

Brett tilts his head, conceding his point. “Yeah. I get you.”

They’re back at the hotel twenty minutes later, dripping sweat and exhausted. The stairs feel like hell, and if Liam were maybe a little less proud, he’d beg Brett to carry him.

He takes the lead, because Brett looks honestly freaked out. And that’s when he remembers - Brett shot Owen. Really shot him. Maybe wasn’t intending to kill him, but still…

Brett’s never inflicted hurt like that on someone before, Liam doesn’t think. Hasn’t been violent in that way. Liam’s been in fights, bad ones, drag-down curb-stompers that he’d lost by fucking miles, but he’d always dragged himself out of the gutter with the knowledge that he only did what he had to to survive.

Brett isn’t built for combat against people. Not psychologically. So Liam takes the lead when they walk in, and Hayden and Vinnie turn to them.

There’s a pause. Hayden stares at Brett, then at Liam, then says, “You’re bleeding.”

He is. There’s blood snaking down his neck from where his head hit the pavement. “It’s fine,” he says softly.

“Where’s Owen?” Vinnie asks slowly.

“Vinnie,” Brett murmurs. “We… went and saw Lex.”

Vinnie perks up. “Lex?” he asks excitedly. “You went and saw-”

“She’s dead, Vin,” Liam says shortly, and maybe he could’ve been more tactful about it, because yeah, that must be a nasty anvil to have dropped on your head. But he’s out of patience for the day and he wants answers, and they aren’t getting any honest ones from Owen.

“Dead?” Vinnie asks blankly. “No, she…”

“We found her body and put her to rest properly,” Brett says softly. “She didn’t deserve to be left like that.”

“Owen said we could fix…”

He trails off. They all wait nervously; Liam’s fingers itch at his knife. He’s ready if anything happens.

“She’s dead,” Vinnie says slowly.

Brett and Hayden exchange glances. Vinnie seems to be surfacing, finally, for the first time in maybe months.

“I remember,” Vinnie whispers. “She’s gone? She’s… how?”

“Her neck was snapped,” Brett tells him quietly.

Vinnie leans forward, heaves a huge sob, and says, “Owen lied.”

“Lied?” Liam asks.

“He - he let me - think she was - that she wasn’t one of them… why did he let me think that?”

“He thought it was better for you,” Brett murmurs. “That you didn’t know, because of how she died… what she did before Owen stopped her.”

“What she did?” Vinnie sounds genuinely confused; Liam frowns.

“Yeah. You know, pinning you to the ground? Attacking you?” he tries. “He must’ve pulled or off or…”

Vinnie’s shaking his head. “That’s not what happened,” he moans fitfully. “That’s not what happened. She didn’t attack me. Never would have. We attacked her.”

“What?” Hayden asks.

“We joined them,” Vinnie says hollowly. “I remember. After we lost Liam in California, Owen said we couldn’t make it on our own. Maybe… maybe he was right. Lex… we caught her. I never wanted to be with the Keepers, I didn’t eat if I could help it… I remember. We got out together. And Owen… he tracked us down?”

_I should have killed him._ The thought encompasses his mind like a black swarm, buzzing furiously. _I should have fucking killed him when I had the chance-_

“The Keepers,” Vinnie says vaguely. “There’s a hierarchy. We were bottom-tier. Owen… he took this girl hostage. Leverage, because they were going to execute me. For helping Lex. The girl… I think her name was Ashley, maybe. There was this one guy - Theo. Would’ve done anything to get her back. Nearly pulled it off, but Ashley fought back and Owen - he did something, she died, and then…”

They wait. Liam’s anger is burning out of him; he’s exhausted. Now they know why the Keepers have a personal agenda. Because Owen fucking killed Theo’s… girlfriend, or favourite slave, or… something.

“Owen freed me and Lex,” Vinnie finishes. “Somehow. Only Lex because she was in the same cage. I woke up one morning and… Owen said she ran away, and we looked for her… found her. Like that. Dead.” Vinnie’s eyes are beginning to get glossy. “I think he killed her.”

“You’re sure?” Brett asks softly.

“Keepers… they would’ve shot her. Clean wound, you know? Through the head? Prevent reanimation, make use of the corpse.” It all sounds pretty clinical, but Liam’s not having a hard time seeing why this would cause Vinnie to completely fucking snap. It makes what he’s been through look like a fucking picnic.

“But it was her neck.” Vinnie looks at Brett as he says it. “That’s… what you said, right? Her neck was snapped?”

“Yes.” Brett’s voice is quiet.

“Yeah. Owen. That’s how he does it… doesn’t waste bullets.”

“He’s killed more than one person?” Hayden demands.

Vinnie blinks. “We were Keepers,” he says blankly. “You should know. You were with them.”

They don’t ask him how he knows. It doesn’t matter. Maybe he overheard them. Maybe he deduced it. Maybe Liam’s story about how they met just didn’t add up right in his head. Either way, he knows, and it doesn’t matter.

Vinnie looks at Liam. “He never would have hurt you,” he mumbles. “Or me. So why’s it matter?’

Liam’s mouth opens of its own accord, then closes. "What, I’m supposed to give him a cookie for doing shit he’s supposed to, like not killing people?” he asks. “And what about the people who aren’t important to him?”

“They aren’t important to you, either,” Vinnie says tiredly.

“That doesn’t mean their lives are worth less than mine,” Liam responds heatedly. “Christ, Vinnie. He killed the girl you liked just for trying to escape because she was gonna get eaten! How can you let that go?”

Vinnie blinks. “He’s my friend.”

There’s silence. Brett pulls Liam away.

“We can’t take him either,” he says softly.

“Brett, he’s sick, he-”

“We aren’t taking him,” Brett says lowly. “He’s not gonna come with us and Owen won’t let us leave with him anyway.”

Brett’s right. Owen’s done everything for Vinnie. And Liam knows how loyal the guy can be.

Liam turns to Vinnie. “If we don’t hurt you,” he says, “will Owen let us leave the city without trying to kill Brett? Or Hayden?”

Vinnie nods. “He won’t hurt Hayden,” he says. “It’s just Brett he’s got beef with.”

“Why?” Liam demands.

“Because Brett fought back,” Vinnie replies.

Brett runs a hand through his hair. “Of course,” he says tiredly. “Of fucking course.”

“Right, it doesn’t matter,” Liam says. “We let you go, he lets us go. Deal?”

“Whatever,” Vinnie mumbles.

“Don’t you care?” Liam demands. “At all?”

“Not really,” Vinnie says, looking up at Liam. “What’s it matter? In ten or twenty years all fuel will be evaporated or used up. Canned food will be gone. Agriculture has slowed to nothingness. Medicine has gone backwards by thousands of years, not because we don’t know how, but because we were too reliant on machines and can’t. People are fighting for what remaining habitable space there is and killing each other. Why should I care if I’m around to see it or not?”

“Because the alternative is aligning with the Keepers and pre-emptively destroying everything, leaving no hope that maybe somewhere, someone has a cure,” Brett argues.

“If there was a cure, they would’ve found it by now,” Vinnie says. “Do whatever you want. I don’t care. I’m alive because Owen forces me to be, otherwise I would’ve checked out a long time ago.”

There’s silence for a moment. Liam and Vinnie stare at each other.

“I’m gonna find an RV,” Hayden whispers.

“I’m gonna get our stuff,” Brett murmurs.

They’re left alone. Vinnie rubs his face.

“It was you, you know,” he says. “After we thought we’d lost you and Garrett got bit… that’s when everything went to shit. I know you don’t believe us when we say it, but losing you wrecked us. You’re like a little brother to us. When we thought… well. The Keepers sounded like the best option, at least to Owen, and I… just didn’t care enough to disagree.”

“You’re right,” Liam says. “I don’t believe you. And nothing you have to say about it makes any of this even remotely okay.”

“We know,” Vinnie murmurs. “But we were going to hell a long time before we joined them.”

“Hell,” Liam says. “You say it like we aren’t already living in it.”

~*~

By the time they’ve exited the hotel, Hayden’s found a working RV and she and Brett are piling their things into it.

Liam leaves Owen and Vinnie’s supplies with Vin. “You’d better tell him we let you go,” he says shortly.

Vinnie nods.

“He killed Lex,” Brett says suddenly. “You loved her, right? And he killed her. So why ally with him again after that? Even now, when you know and understand?”

“Because he’s all I’ve got,” Vinnie mumbles. “And I can forget again.”

Nothing, until now, has terrified Liam more than the prospect of losing his mind enough to forget his past. Now he adds a new level of fear to the list: being so tortured by his past he actively wants to forget it.

The next few hours are harrowing. They leave Vinnie there and make a break for it - Hayden’s behind the wheel because she knows this city best out of all of them, and for a while, Liam’s sure they’re going to get caught. That a rain of gunfire is going to split the RV open and puncture them like a can opener does to metal.

It never comes. After a while, he realises that Theo must still be unconscious, tied up, or both - that his Keepers mustn’t have found him. That maybe Owen hunkered down to try and fix the trauma Brett inflicted on his shoulder.

And they make it.

They run over a few zombies on the way, but they’re out; they zip out of the city’s limits and they’re on a wide expanse of road, one Liam quickly identifies as the 191. A few freshman geography lessons are enough to tell him that they’re heading for Wyoming.

“I can’t believe we’re alive,” Brett says, stunned.

“I can’t believe I’m not with the Keepers anymore,” Hayden murmurs. “I owe you guys my life.”

Brett smiles at her. “You can start by taking the first driving shift. In the meantime…” He stands up and heads to Liam, who’s sitting on the edge of the RV’s bed with Fudge panting at his feet. “How about we sleep?”

God. Liam’s eyes feel like they’re being weighted shut by chunks of steel; he nods, strips out of his shirt. “Okay,” he replies exhaustedly. “I get the window spot though.”

“It’s all yours, Li,” Brett says, smiling tenderly, and Liam’s out the moment he keels over and lets his head hit the pillow.

~*~

Someone’s screaming.

It takes him a moment to realise he’s thrashing helplessly, caught in something, and that the screams are being ripped from his own throat; for a moment, he doesn’t register why he’s so scared, until he feels hands on him, pinning him.

Keepers. Theo. Doug. The end of the line, such as it is - a slave camp. He’ll be bought, used, and sold, over and over again, and Doug is only the first of many-

“Liam!” The voice cuts into his panicked track of thought. “Liam!”

He doesn’t know how the Keeper worked out his name. Maybe he’s gone the same way Vinnie did and he blocked everything out after Doug got him and the rest was an illusion, and this - this is his reality, thrashing against the person holding him down and begging incoherently for them not to hurt him.

“Brett, what’s going on?” a female voice demands shrilly.

“No no no,” Liam whimpers, and a hand comes near his face - he feels the heat of it and thinks, _God, this is it; I’m gonna be smothered to death while someone-_

He jerks his head back, sees stars as it slams against something hard, and the person pinning him down makes a terrible, shocked, frightened noise.

“Brett? What was that?”

“He - he hit his head, really hard, I-”

“Is he okay?”

“I’ll calm him down, I’ll get him calm, just - don’t stop, okay-” Hands, on his thigh and shoulder. Pinning him down. He pulls, but he can’t escape - the person’s bigger than him, much stronger.

Doug. He’s got no chance against Doug; he didn’t in Ashburton and he doesn’t now.

“Liam-”

He wails, and the person holding him down flinches. “Oh, _God_ ,” the voice says, and it breaks over the last word, distressed. “God, Liam, c'mon, baby, come back to me-”

“Let me go,” Liam howls. “Please-”

“Just let him go!” the female voice yells.

“If I let him go he’s gonna hurt himself - Liam, it’s me, it’s just me, please, you’re safe-”

“I don’t know where I am,” Liam moans, twisting under the hands holding him down. “Where am I? Where am I?” His voice comes out as a sob.

“Liam, you’re in the RV, you’re safe-”

“No,” he chokes, and he can barely get air into his lungs - his chest is on fire and he’s gasping for breath, feeling the lack of oxygen beginning to cloud his head and his coherency. “No, no, no-” He reaches up, grabs one of the hands on his shoulder, tries to push it off.

“Brett?” a voice calls, sounding frightened.

“Hayden, stop the RV,” the male voice answers. “We have to stop moving-”

“If we stop - and you said-”

“He’s fucking dissociating!” the male voice bellows. “If we don’t stop he’s going to get worse! Pull over!”

Liam’s hand is slick with sweat; it slips off the wrist he’s gripping, and he opens his eyes briefly, but it’s dark and the shapes around him are unfamiliar and looming, and he closes them again, gives a full-bodied jerk to try and free himself.

“Fuck!” the male voice swears. “God, Liam, hold still, please hold still-”

“Is he-”

“He’s freaking the fuck out and he’s strong, I need your help back here-”

Liam gives another almighty twist and almost succeeds in freeing himself - would have if it weren’t for the sudden rending pain in his side, just beneath his ribs. He howls pathetically, tries to move the opposite way - to curl up in a ball - but the hands keep holding him down.

“Liam, Liam, stay still,” the voice pleads. “Please, buddy, you’re gonna hurt yourself-”

“Should you be holding him down like that?”

“If I don’t hold him down he’s gonna hit his head again, I need to hold him down-”

“Just - how do we snap him out of it?”

“I don’t know, I don’t _know_ , he’s never been this bad before, he’s never not known it was me - I, uh, I um-”

“Brett, c'mon,” the female voice pleads.

“Water, just - water, a towel, _something_ -” Liam hears footsteps, but he’s too busy wriggling and panting through the sharp, jerking pain in his side to pay much attention. His panic is lending him strength but the person pinning him down is stronger, and-

Pinning him. Pinning him down. Arm around his neck, knife at his throat. Wheezing breath and the soft, ominous snick of a belt buckle slithering open, and a voice, _that’s it, just hold still-_

He wrenches his body left, the person swears, and his side erupts into pain anew; he’s whimpering between sobs and gasps for air, and there are white starbursts behind his eyes.

“Hayden, hurry, he’s getting worse-”

He tries sitting up, only to be pushed back into the mattress. “Don’t,” he cries. “Don’t-”

“Watch out, he might lash out - thanks, thank you-”

Something lands over him - a blanket, maybe - and in the next second there’s something cool against his head, and he hadn’t realised till now just how overheated he is, that his hair is dripping with sweat, that the mattress beneath him is-

Mattress.

Something about the soft surface he’s on registers as that in his mind, and - he was at the store, wasn’t he? With Doug? But - no, the floor was hard and cold, and here-

“He’s calming down,” the female voice breathes.

“Stay quiet,” the male voice whispers back as Liam flinches. “Let him relax.”

There’s a long pause. His side hurts still. He registers, now, that it is a blanket over him - that he’s warm, that while there are hands on him, he’s not really being held down anymore. The urge to struggle has subsided a little.

A wet cloth moves against his head - someone’s wiping his temples and neck, then his forehead, then moving onto his shoulders. He shivers a little.

“Hey, Liam,” the male voice says softly. “Haven’t done this in a while, huh?” The person sounds like they might be smiling a little. “Last time you were just coming out of surgery.”

Surgery. Wiping his face. What was the surgery for? His side. So that’s why it hurts. And he needed surgery because…

He blinks his eyes open blearily. It’s still dark, but the low light of a candle permeates the space nearby, and even that causes his retinas to sear. He blinks, twice, forcing his eyes open each time, and lolls his head back.

Brett’s leaning over him, diligently wiping his face and neck with a wet cloth. Brett. It was never the Keeper - Brett was the one holding him down.

“Brett,” he croaks.

Brett’s head jerks up; he’s been crying. Might still be. “Fuck,” he croaks.

“’M sorry,” Liam mumbles.

“Don’t be sorry.” Brett tucks the blanket closer to him. “Not your fault.” A tremulous smile graces his mouth. “Besides, I think you scared Hayden way more than you scared me.”

Unlikely, but Liam still tries to roll over to look at her, giving a low noise of pain at his side twinging. She’s crying too, but when he focusses on her, she leans over and smooths his hair back hesitantly.

He closes his eyes. “Sorry for scaring you,” he whispers. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay.” Her voice breaks.

There’s quiet for a moment; Brett moves the wet cloth from his face to his side. “I suppose now is as good a time as any to tell you he has pretty severe PTSD,” he says to Hayden tiredly.

“He’s been like this before?”

“Not like this.” Brett’s hands are gentle. “Fuck, he really hurt himself…”

“Still awake,” Liam mumbles. “Head hurts.”

“You whacked it on the wall. It’ll be fine though. Here.” There’s a water bottle at his lips. “Drink, okay? Then rest.”

“Don’t go,” Liam says, and finally manages to get his eyes open properly so he can look at Brett pleadingly. “Please.”

“I won’t.” Brett looks shaken. “Never should have in the first place.”

~*~

He wakes up woozy and disoriented, his head in Brett’s lap, the wet towel still curled around his neck and shoulders, the rest of him draped haphazardly in a few blankets. Like he’s sick or convalescent.

He rolls a little. Brett tilts his head. “You awake?”

Liam nods.

“How’re you feeling?”

“Sore,” Liam groans.

“Yeah. You put up one hell of a fight last night.” Brett’s hands flutter around him helplessly. “I’m sorry. About pinning you down. I didn’t know what else to do-”

“Don’t say sorry,” Liam croaks, beginning to sit upright. “You did what you had to. Sorry I made it hard for you.”

He looks around; they’re in the RV. He feels shivery and sore, but Brett had the right idea about the wet towel - it calmed him down and brought him back. Now that he is, he ditches it to the side and curls the blanket around his shoulders.

“Did I wake up again?”

“No. You slept through.” Brett puts an arm around him; Liam hears movement to his right and turns.

Hayden’s sitting on the little couch, smiling uncertainly. “Morning.”

He’s too tired to feel embarrassed or ashamed right now; that will come later. “Morning,” he says huskily.

“Hungry?” Hayden asks softly.

“I can eat,” Liam admits, and tries to ignore the way Brett’s entire body slouches with undeniable relief. “Thanks. For taking care of me last night.”

“No problem.” It comes out easily, but Liam knows it had to have been scary for her.

They eat for a little while. Liam’s still tired, but he turns obediently when Brett goes to check up on his side.

“Does it still hurt?” Brett asks softly.

“No.” Liam blinks wearily. “It did last night.”

“You wrenched it pretty bad. As long as it isn’t hurting now.”

Liam shakes his head, and they all eat quietly for a while. He wonders if Hayden feels awkward. He can feel that Brett’s still tense, like he’s waiting for another meltdown. It’s just struck him that Brett probably had to hold him down for a while last night - stop him hitting his head or, God, lashing out and hurting someone else…

He tips his head back, closes his eyes, and swallows. “I’m really sorry about last night,” he says quietly - and there it is. The embarrassment has started seeping into him. “Yesterday - yesterday was-” He doesn’t even know how to put it into words, the way yesterday had obliterated his nerves to the point of leaving him numb.

Thankfully, he doesn’t have to, because Hayden steps in. “It’s okay,” she says quickly. “You don’t need to explain. We’re just glad you’re better.”

Liam nods, not trusting his voice. Brett shifts a little.

“We’re pulled over,” he explains softly. “On the side of the road. We just crossed the border into Wyoming.”

Wyoming. How far did they drive yesterday? “Are we near a town?” Liam asks. “A city?”

Brett looks at Hayden. “We aren’t sure,” he says hesitantly. “We aren’t good with maps and we aren’t sure where about on the border we crossed. Maybe you could…”

Relieved to have something to do other than sitting around feeling and probably looking pathetic and wrung-out, Liam nods quickly. “Yeah,” he says. “Gimme the map. I’ll work out where we are.”

Hayden finds the map and Brett hands over his glasses; Liam sits and looks at it for a moment, trying to work out where they were last in Idaho. He eventually pinpoints the city and begins to follow the roads out of there.

“How’s he do that?” Hayden asks.

“He’s like the Jesus of geography,” Brett responds. “Give him a map, a start point, and where you wanna go, and he’ll find a way there.”

Liam circles the next town. “We’re about eighty miles from the next town,” he says. “We can go straight on this road, it’ll lead us right through. Place is called Pinedale. Doesn’t look like it’ll be very big, but there might be something there.”

“Alright,” Brett says, looking relieved and maybe even a little relaxed for the first time in… well, Liam can’t remember the last time he did. “Awesome. Pinedale it is. Stop, refuel, see if we can find any food.”

“We could stop and rest,” Hayden points out. “The Keepers don’t travel out this far, and they only stop in major cities. If there was a hotel we could rest.”

“We’ve just been breaking into houses,” Liam says sheepishly.

“Well, that works too.”

~*~

Liam drives the middle stretch of the trip.

He’s a little nervous, because he still doesn’t have a lot of driving experience - not as much as he’d like, anyway - and this RV is decidedly larger than their last.

Still, Brett sits up in the passenger seat with him, talking to him, and that’s really nice. They haven’t had time to just sit and talk for a really long time. Brett’s a lot smarter than him, worldlier - not anyone’s fault, really; Liam was only just starting high school when all this started, and Brett had almost two years of college under his belt by then. Liam likes listening to him, feeling like he’s learning something new every time Brett opens his mouth.

Hayden’s sleeping in the back. When it’s her turn to drive, Brett sleeps and Liam keeps her company. He’s not tired. He doesn’t know how long he was crashed out yesterday, but it had to have been a while, given that his eyes feel like they’re wired open.

“The map stuff,” Hayden says, and Liam looks up at her. “How do you know all that?”

Liam shrugs. “Mom,” he explains. “We used to go on these really long car trips to, uh…”

To get away from his dad. He doesn’t feel comfortable revealing that just yet. “Anyway,” he says quickly, all too aware that she’s noticed his hesitation, “long car trips. We’d spend ages poring over maps and looking at where we wanted to go. She always had a backup route planned. She taught me how to read them so I’d stop asking "are we there yet”. Took a while before I was good, but yeah.“

"That sounds cool.” She’s smiling, but it fades as she looks out the windscreen. “Wish I could’ve done that with my parents.”

“When did they…?” he asks awkwardly.

“I was ten.”

He nods. “I’m sorry,” he says.

“Thanks.” She smiles a little. “You should go sleep with Brett. I’ll let you guys know when we get there.”

He’s not tired, but he’s also not opposed to the idea of just lying with Brett for half an hour and resting. So that’s what he does - curls up next to him, throws an arm and a leg over Brett’s torso, and closes his eyes.

~*~

“Hey.”

Liam blinks his eyes open; Brett’s stirring underneath him. Hayden’s shaking his shoulder, smiling.

“We’re here.”

“Oh,” he says stupidly.

“Wakey-wakey, Li,” Brett murmurs, sitting up and catching Liam’s body before he can slither down onto the mattress bonelessly. “Looks like we got shit to do.”

Liam blinks, shakes his head to try and clear it. He must’ve fallen asleep. He doesn’t remember even feeling tired, but he’s got that disoriented, groggy feeling of a just-too-long midday nap lingering in his body.

Pinedale, like Liam predicted, is tiny. He can’t imagine that it would’ve had more than two or three thousand people in it before; Brett and Hayden look a little nonplussed when they step out of the RV too. The only one who doesn’t seem confused is Fudge, who promptly leaps down the steps, heads to the closest bush, and pees on it.

At least one of them is functioning normally. Liam hefts his crossbow up onto his shoulder, wincing, and says, “Alright, game plan?”

“Fuel,” Hayden says immediately. “If there is any. Otherwise we won’t be getting far.”

“Food and shelter next,” Brett says. “Looks like a safe place. Not even any corpses in the streets. Maybe we can hole up here for a bit.” He’s looking at Liam as he says it; Brett clearly wants him off the road, away from potential stressors, and resting. And Liam… can’t say he thinks that’s a bad idea, really.

“Alright,” Liam says. “I’ll look for somewhere to stay. I’ll take Fudge with me. You guys - fuel and food.” He looks around. “Don’t have long till the sun sets,” he murmurs. “We can sleep in the RV if we have to, but somewhere else would be nice.”

“Agreed,” Brett says. “Alright. Meet back in…?”

“Bout half an hour?” Liam asks.

“Yeah.” It’s hard to measure time with no watches. “Any longer than forty five minutes, we go looking. Deal?”

“Deal.”

~*~

It doesn’t take Liam long to find somewhere suitable.

The motel is low to the ground, brick and wood veneer, sturdy. He wanders through a few of the rooms - no corpses. In fact, the first zombie he sees is on his way back to their rendezvous point.

When he makes it back to the RV, he sits down outside and closes his eyes. His head feels weird and spinny; he can’t wait to just fucking sleep.

Fudge lies down next to him and huffs, then nudges Liam’s hand with his nose. Liam obediently gets him some water and food out, smiling a little as he watches the dog eat. For a moment, it crosses his mind that Fudge has been more loyal and protective of him than Owen and Vinnie have.

In the next moment, he’s shaking his head and trying not to think about Owen and Vinnie at all. He’s still having trouble accepting that Owen, at least, had obviously gone darkside a long time before Brett and Liam rolled into Idaho, stupidly and blindly trusting.

He rubs his face.

“Li?”

He turns. Brett’s coming towards him, a small smile on his face.

Fudge wags his tail and pants happily as Brett returns, and Brett laughs, pats his head. “Hey, buddy,” he says affectionately.

“I thought I was your buddy,” Liam whines.

“You are.” Brett puts an arm around his shoulders and tugs him closer. “My best buddy in fact.”

“Only 'cause there’s no one else around.”

“Nah, you’d still be my best buddy.” Brett smiles at him softly. “Had anything to eat?”

He’s forgotten again. “No,” he murmurs.

“Here.” Brett opens his pack. “Found some food. We could really do with some fruits and vegetables, but that’s not gonna happen anytime soon.”

Liam nods, sighing as he takes the powerbar Brett offers him and begins chewing on it. River’s End had vegetables, even some fruit - only apples, but there was a strawberry patch going in and Liam had promised Savannah he’d pick them with her when they were ripe.

His throat tightens; Brett notices him swallowing.

“Find a place to stay?”

“Motel,” Liam says, grateful for the distraction. “Not too far from here. I only saw one zombie.”

“Small town,” Brett murmurs. “Maybe two thousand people. If they all died and reanimated, maybe they formed a herd. Wandered off elsewhere.”

It wouldn’t surprise Liam; zombies do that. Herd together, inexplicably, competing for once food source, instead of going off on their own. Liam doesn’t really understand it; a lone zombie will always join a herd if it can. It doesn’t make sense from a survival standpoint… then again, they’re not really alive.

He yawns. Brett notices. “Sleepy?”

“Yeah. A little.” He’s more tired than sleepy, and somehow there’s a distinction between them.

“How long are we staying here?” Brett asks softly.

Liam thinks for a moment. “Guess it depends,” he says. “On how much food we can find. We need to be able to make it, you know?”

“Yeah. If there’s game, though - we could stock up on meat.”

“That’s a good idea. I’ll check it out at some point.” Brett could be onto something; it’s warm here but not nearly as hot as the last place they were in, and that gives Liam hope that maybe there are some deer around.

They chat for a while longer, with Liam’s head lolled against Brett’s shoulder and arm. It only ends when Hayden appears around the corner.

“Hey,” she says. “I found a fuel stop. It’s a while from here - I’m gonna take the RV and fill it up. Did you guys find anything?”

“Lotta food at the grocery store,” Brett says. “We don’t have competition so I didn’t bring it all back. Liam found a motel we can stay at.”

“Oh.” She looks almost happy. “Cool. Want me to drop you guys there?”

It sounds a lot better than walking, even if it isn’t far, so they agree. They somehow trust that Hayden will come back. At this point, if she had allegiances to the Keepers still, they would’ve revealed themselves by now. She could have easily hurt or killed Liam when he was freaking last night - belted Brett over the head and finished it - but she didn’t.

The moment they step into the motel room, it hits Liam like a truck - for the first time in almost a month, they’re totally alone, with no one across the hall and nothing to do other than wait for Hayden to get back.

He turns to Brett - who already has his pack off and is surging towards him, and Liam gasps at the sudden sensation of Brett’s hands on his sides and under his shirt and his mouth, first on Liam’s and then elsewhere - his jaw and neck and the soft little spot behind his ear that drives him crazy.

“Liam,” Brett groans, and he’s pushing Liam’s pack off. “C'mon-”

“Lube,” Liam gasps. “Front pocket.”

“Condom?”

“Don’t bother,” Liam says, and they tumble onto the bed with their belts and pants open and dicks straining desperately against their boxers; Brett wastes no time in yanking the rest of Liam’s clothes off and then spreading a liberal amount of lube onto his fingers. He doesn’t even flip Liam over; he usually does, likes to take time getting into position, but not today.

“Cold,” he says, and Liam’s body might flinch from the temperature of the lube, but he sighs, then moans, as one of Brett’s fingers sinks right into him and begins to move. It doesn’t take long before he’s relaxed enough for a second, then a third.

“Missed you,” Brett mumbles against his throat. “So much.”

“Mm, hurry up, c'mon. Please.”

With that, Brett’s leaning back and coating himself in the lube, stroking Liam gently at the same time. Liam shivers, lifts his hips and thinks _please, please, hurry up, please get over here and inside me_ , and maybe he says some of it aloud, because Brett’s eyes go dark and lustful and then he’s pushing in.

Liam almost cries, it feels that good. It’s tight - they haven’t done this in a while - but it doesn’t hurt, and soon enough he’s got his legs locked around Brett’s waist and ribs, squeezing him, a litany of noises falling helplessly from his lips, things like _yes, like that_ , or _harder, please_ , or just _oh God._

“Good?” Brett pants.

“Yeah,” Liam moans; Brett’s really pounding him, hard, and the headboard is slamming against the wall. Brett grabs his hips, repositions him, and Liam whimpers as his cock brushes right up against his prostate.

“There,” he whispers.

“Like that?”

“Keep going, keep going-”

Brett ducks his head and begins sucking at his jaw and throat, and his thrusts are beginning to stutter; Liam arches his hips, desperate, just needing a tiny bit more to send him over the edge, and Brett, seeming to realise, obeys wordlessly - he reaches down and grabs Liam’s cock and says, “Come for me,” and Liam does - he flies apart at the seams, a shaking, whimpering mess, and by the time he’s finally beginning to relax, Brett’s thrusts are-

“Where?” Brett gasps. “Quick-”

“Inside,” Liam pants. “Come inside, I don’t care-”

Brett groans, and with a few final thrusts - so rough that Liam, sensitive from his own orgasm, keens loudly - comes inside him, burying his face in Liam’s neck and shaking like he’s coming down off a drug high.

Liam lets out a breath as Brett slows to a stop inside him, then collapses down on top of him. They’re both panting, and Liam’s blood is singing with endorphins and other hormones that make him want to kiss every inch of Brett’s skin and tell him how much he loves him.

“She knew,” Brett pants.

“Huh?” Liam breathes back.

Brett leans back a little, and Liam groans as Brett shifts inside him. “She knew we wanted to fuck,” Brett says. “That’s why she left.”

Liam lets his legs relax a little; his thighs are shaking from the effort of keeping them around Brett’s waist. He’s still breathing hard when Brett leans down to kiss him messily, then leans back and says, “Aw, did I tire you out?”

“Yes,” Liam puffs, and Brett laughs. “You fucked me - to within an inch - of my life.”

“And you loved it,” Brett says smugly, and Liam’s stomach flips itself over like his body might be getting ready for round two - because yeah, he did. He always does. Sometimes he gets embarrassed, not because he does, because he has no problem with liking it - but because of how obvious he apparently makes it.

Brett smiles. “Not that I don’t love this or anything, Li, but if Hayden comes back and finds us like this, she might gauge her eyes out.”

“I don’t see why she would,” Liam grumbles, shifting a little to let Brett pull out. “We’re both hot.”

“Think there’s a little more to it than that.” Brett wets a cloth and comes back to Liam, smiling almost shyly, and Liam just manages to bite back the _I’m not an invalid_ retort at the back of his throat. Instead, he lets Brett wipe him down gently, then rolls onto his belly.

“Sorry if I was rough.”

“Don’t be,” Liam says, stretching. “It was great.” He’ll be feeling it for a while, but that only makes it better. “Wish we could do it more often.”

“You like it like that?” Brett asks. “Hard, I mean?”

“I always like what you do to me. You know that.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m just fishing. I want you to stroke my ego.”

“You need me to tell you how good you are in bed?” Liam sits up properly; he feels bruised and exhausted, but in a good way this time. “I mean, I came so hard I saw stars.”

Brett puffs his chest out. “Aw. It was nothin’.” His eyes skate Liam’s body, assessing; he looks sad. “Jesus Christ,” he murmurs. “You still look pretty beaten up.”

Liam shrugs. “Doesn’t hurt as bad anymore.” Brett’s probably right; he probably does look like a human pincushion. Still, he knows this one thing at least - he’s covered in wounds and still standing on his feet, and that must count for something.

They get dressed slowly. Some of the motel rooms have complimentary food or drink in them - travel-sized packets of off-brand biscuits and little sachets of tea and coffee. The tea might be nice, even if it is kind of warm out to be drinking it.

By the time Hayden is back, with the RV fully refuelled, Liam and Brett are sitting on one of the beds in their chosen room, doing inventory. They’ll sleep together, because they always do, but they found a room with two beds anyway. It would be shitty for Hayden to have to sleep on her own.

“So,” Hayden says as she enters. “Do anything interesting while I was gone?”

“Depends on what you mean by interesting,” Liam sniggers, and Brett elbows him in the side. Hayden looks confused, then vaguely embarrassed.

“Right.”

“Sorry,” Liam laughs. “Had to.”

“He’s _eighteen_ ,” Brett says pointedly when Hayden looks at him. “He never passes up a chance at a dirty joke.”

“You’re both boring,” Liam announces. “How 'bout we eat?”

He can’t help but notice that Brett and Hayden look at him, smiling and happy and realises, in that moment, that he’s behaving normally for once. That Brett recognises this as normal behaviour, his baseline.

He returns the smile gently, even if it is wobbly. “We got any cards?” he asks.

“Probably some,” Brett says. “I’ll have a look.”

They do have cards. Brett teaches them how to play poker, and Hayden wipes the floor with them. Liam’s happy to have her there. At least when he gets bad again, she’ll be there to back Brett up.

When they go to bed, they leave a candle lit. Brett drops right off to sleep, and Hayden’s not far behind him; they both snore, and Liam listens intently to their breathing, watches Brett’s eyes flicker around inside his skull.

There’s moonlight streaming through the window. The world is silent, weirdly silent. Liam grew up listening to cars drive past and the occasional house party and dogs barking and it all had the propensity to trigger his I.E.D - that uncontrollable, unrelenting noise. He couldn’t ever seem to get away from it, reach anywhere that was really, truly quiet. And it dug into him like a burr in his side that itched until it got too much to take, and he exploded, usually taking a few breakables with him in the meltdown.

It’s different now. There are no cars, no muted noises from other peoples’ televisions or radios or just their speech; no dogs, no nothing. The world, it seems to Liam, is resting. Maybe a cull of the human population was exactly what it needed. Before, that’s what Liam needed too.

His thoughts drift to his mom. He wonders if she’d be proud of him. Tonight, he wonders if she ever made it out. If she survived. He doubts it… but it would be nice.

He thinks about her sometimes, although less and less as time wears on. It’s been three years since he saw her last, and while he can recall her face perfectly - because he looks like her, and he can see that whenever he looks at his own reflection - he can’t remember her voice very well anymore. Things she said, yes. But not how she said them or how she sounded.

Thinking about his mom makes him sad. He wishes he’d been a better son before the outbreak. He would be now.

He rolls, tucks his face down against the swell of Brett’s shoulder, and closes his eyes. Hopefully, sleep will be gentle on him tonight.

~*~

It isn’t.

It’s not anything like the night before, the terrifying amnesia that had overcome him when Brett tried to soothe him, but he still has nightmares, and he wakes up at the crack of dawn, sweating and trembling like he’s in the middle of breaking a bad fever.

Brett’s hand is trailing up and down his spine; he notices when Liam’s awake. “Hey,” he whispers.

Liam licks his lips. “Hi,” he whispers back. His voice is wrecked. “Was I making noise?”

“No,” Brett says softly. “You were shaking. It woke me up.”

“Sorry,” Liam murmurs, and Brett shakes his head, moves forward to kiss Liam gently and push his hair back. At least, Liam reflects, he wasn’t fucking whimpering like a scared kid this time around.

Brett touches their foreheads together gently. “I’m gonna keep you safe,” he whispers.

Liam swallows. “Brett-”

“I promise. I’m not gonna let anyone get at you, Liam. No one.”

“You’re gonna have to get inside my head then,” Liam jokes weakly. “Because that’s where they all are. Doug, and Theo… Logan…”

“I would if I could.”

They lie there silently for a while; Brett’s hands are tracing patterns into the soft, sensitive skin along Liam’s sides and belly. He’s leaned out again, he’s noticed - when they were eating enough in River’s End and Tamara had Liam on a high-calorie diet to make up for the amount of exercise he did while scouting, he was beginning to get a tiny bit of padding on his stomach and arms. It’s all gone now, blasted away by the last few weeks.

“Guess that’s a good thing,” he sighs.

“What is?” Brett asks.

“My little rolls are gone.”

Brett smiles, almost like he’s surprised. “Hey. I _liked_ those little rolls.”

“Yeah? I didn’t. I was gonna end up with love handles.”

“And you would’ve been just as hot as you are now,” Brett insists. “Seriously. They were hardly rolls, and… I dunno. They meant you were healthy. Getting enough to eat. Not stressed.”

Liam’s about to reply, but right at that moment, Fudge jumps on the bed, puts a paw on Liam’s shoulder, and whines pitifully.

“Hey, buddy,” Liam smiles, rolling onto his back and watching as Fudge crawls up between them. “What’s up, huh? What’re you doing?”

He licks Liam’s face, whines again, and huffs. “Hungry, huh?” Liam asks. “Okay.” He gives Brett a quick kiss, then rolls up out of bed.

He tries to move fluidly, the way Brett’s used to seeing him move, but it’s hard. His body is still protesting from being held down while struggling the night before last; in fact, he’s only just realised that his injuries are catching up to him.

“You’re sore,” Brett murmurs.

“A little. It’s not too bad.” It isn’t. He heads outside with Fudge and some food.

He stares as he opens the door. The world is almost still, apart from the wind moving through the trees; it’s overcast. This town is cooler than the last, and Liam almost shivers when the breeze hits him.

It’s so peaceful. When Liam was younger he wanted to live in the middle of a city. Close to everything, where the action was. Now, given the chance, this is where he would settle. Away from everyone and everything.

He hears movement behind him; Brett’s followed him out, hair tousled from sleep, eyes drowsy and soft. The tattoos on his chest shift minutely with the light just beginning to break the sky; he looks really stupidly beautiful.

“Peaceful,” he comments softly.

Liam nods; Brett stands behind him, pressing close for warmth when the wind picks up and makes him shiver. Liam leans back a little and lets Brett hold him.

“We could stop,” Brett says.

They could. Nobody would know. If anyone is in DC, they don’t know Brett and Liam are on their way with Brett’s precious blood; the occupants of River’s End would just assume they were dead. Nobody would know.

Except them. They would know.

“We need to keep going,” Liam says softly.

Brett sighs. “I figured you’d say that. But yeah. Okay.”

Liam turns to him. “You don’t want to?”

“The only thing I want is for you to be safe,” Brett says softly.

“Getting rid of this thing is the only way I’ll ever be safe, Brett,” Liam murmurs. “If we stop this thing, reverse it, or something - well, maybe there’s still someone left who can help me. With this.” He gestures vaguely to his head.

Brett opens his mouth, then closes it. “I,” he says.

“Don’t… you don’t have to say anything, okay? I know I need some help with it. And I love you for trying, but I know it’s a bit beyond whatever psych classes you took in college.” Liam tries to smile. “I don’t hold it against you.”

Brett’s arms encircle him slowly; it’s only once his head is tucked down into Liam’s shoulder that Liam realises he’s crying.

His chest clenches; he rubs Brett’s back. He might be the one suffering from dissociative episodes and flashbacks and nightmares, but Brett’s the one who has to watch on helplessly - Brett’s the one who has to pin him down to stop him from hurting himself. Liam thinks, honestly, that that might be worse. God knows he’d rather suffer himself than watch Brett go through it. He would have given anything to trade places with Brett when he was in that coma, just to ensure that he was safe. That he’d live.

Brett pulls away from him, wipes his eyes on his wrists. “Sorry,” he croaks. “I just - I know you don’t hold it against me. But I do. I hold it against me.”

Liam tries to smile. “It’ll be okay,” he says gently. “I… look, there might be a few things rattling around in my head that shouldn’t be. But I’m not Vinnie. I know what’s going on. And as long as I know what’s going on, I can try to fight it off and I can get help for it.”

“The night before last…”

He knows what Brett’s talking about then. He didn’t know what was going on. The terrifying part is that Liam doesn’t know if it was a one-off, or just the first of many.

“I was a bit stressed,” Liam says, and it’s the understatement of the century - which is maybe the reason it suddenly strikes them both as funny, and they start laughing.

Hayden appears in the doorway after a moment. “Morning,” she says sleepily.

“Morning, Hayds.”

She quirks her eyebrows. “Hayds?”

Liam shrugs. “Sounds fine, right?”

“Yeah. Sure. I feel like a real part of the family now.” She’s smiling though, and she joins their little huddle and adds to the warmth.

They go about the day - Liam decides to go hunting. They need more meat, or food in general, before they hit the next big city (and big disaster).

He kneels down, tying his shoelaces up, and reaches for his crossbow.

That’s when he hears a crackling noise.

He blinks and turns, looking for the source - it sounds almost like a radio. Like one of the old ones his stepdad constantly had tuned into the news stations, only this sounds more like the white noise between stations.

The crackling stops. Liam tilts his head; Fudge’s ears are swivelled forwards, and he whines, heading over to Brett’s pack.

Liam follows him curiously, straining his ears for any indication of what it might be. There’s a long pause - almost two minutes, enough for Liam to want to give up - before he hears it again, louder this time.

“What?” he murmurs, kneeling down and opening Brett’s pack. He digs right through to the bottom, and that’s when he touches it - one of the hand-held radios Malia always had on their scouting missions.

_They gave us one_ , Liam realises, and his heart shoots up into his throat, beginning to pulse. _They gave it to Brett - but why is it-_

It blares static again, and before he really thinks about what he’s doing, Liam calls out, “Brett!”

It’s only after he’s finished yelling that he has the sudden thought that he’s imagining things. That he’s so desperate to be back at River’s End, amongst his friends, that he might actually be going completely insane. That his mind is lying to him _again_. And when he thinks it, he shrinks back from the radio, dropping it on Brett’s pack hastily, and retreats.

“Liam?”

He turns around. Brett looks scared - he’s panting like he’s run to get to Liam. “What’s wrong?” he asks. “Are you alright?”

“I - I’m fine.” Liam blinks. “I thought I…”

Brett steps forward. “What?” he asks gently.

Liam shakes his head. “I might’ve imagined it,” he says timidly. “Sorry. Sorry for scaring you.”

Brett’s hand lands on his back, begins to rub softly at his shoulder blade. “Tell me what you heard,” he says softly. “Yeah? We’ll work it out together.”

Liam swallows. “The radio,” he murmurs.

“You heard the radio?”

“I thought I heard the radio. But I - maybe I’m hallucinating, I…”

Brett looks at him, his face crumpled in sympathy. “Do you feel like you’re hallucinating?”

“Well, no,” Liam says, flustered. “But I never feel like I’m hallucinating or dissociating. I just do it and I realise later.”

Brett opens his mouth to reply, but just then, the radio bursts to life - another outpouring of static and white noise that causes Brett’s head to whip around and look to it, bewildered.

“I’m not hallucinating,” Liam breathes.

“No,” Brett replies shakily. “You’re not.”

“Why do you think it’s freaking out?” Liam asks.

Brett picks it up and presses on the answer button. “Hello?” he asks.

More white noise. No speech. Brett rubs his face, visibly frustrated. “They must be out of range,” he says. “Just close enough we can hear them trying, but not close enough for us to actually communicate.”

“How do you know they’re trying to reach us?” Liam asks. “And not someone else?”

“These are paired,” Brett says. “They don’t transmit the message to multiple different handsets. Someone is using the other half of this pair to contact us, specifically.”

“Oh. Wait,” Liam rushes to say, noticing Brett about to speak. “Does that mean they’re in trouble? Why would they try to get onto us if they weren’t?”

Brett gnaws at his lip. “Liam,” he says softly. “Look, just because the other half of this radio pair is transmitting to us… it doesn’t mean it’s them.”

“Who the fuck else would it be?” Liam snaps, irritated.

“If someone got into River’s End-”

“Nobody got into River’s End,” Liam says shortly.

“Liam, listen,” Brett pleads. “When we left that place they were only just beginning to rebuild the wall patrol and scouting teams, they were down almost thirty people from the virus - anything could’ve happened since we left. It could be someone else. Or they could be in trouble. Or both.”

“Or they’re just trying to contact us to say hi-”

“Why would they wait almost a month?” Brett asks. “ And if they had that ability, they’d be checking in way more often. Liam, c'mon, buddy. Think about this. I know it’s scary but they might actually be in trouble.”

“So what do we do?” Liam asks helplessly. “Brett, we’re so far away - if they’re in trouble and we go back it’ll take us weeks. And that’s if we don’t run into problems. Which we will, because it’s us, and one of us is bound to end up, I dunno, sick or hurt or both-”

“We’re closer to River’s End than DC,” Brett says.

“The cure-”

“There might not even be a cure,” Brett mumbles helplessly. “Liam, I’m the only one so far. I’m not the answer to anything-”

“You are to me,” Liam says, and his voice wobbles a little. He clears his throat, tries to steady it - he’s spent way too much time being emotional lately - and then continues on. “Brett, if we don’t make it to DC-”

“A few weeks isn’t gonna matter, Li,” Brett says softly. “If there’s a way to make a cure in DC, it’s there. If not, there probably never was. But we have definite proof that something’s going on back home-”

“It feels like a waste,” Liam whispers. “To just turn around and go back-”

“Liam,” Brett pleads. “Your PTSD is so bad out here I barely recognise you. I’ve wanted to go back since we left, since you had that first night terror. We can at least bring more people this time, be safer as a group-”

“Larger groups mean larger targets,” Liam argues, choosing to ignore Brett’s point about his mental health. “We can’t just give up on the whole world-”

“We aren’t,” Brett whispers, leaning forward to hold Liam’s face. “We aren’t giving up on them, okay? We’re gonna come back to it. But not right now. Not like this.”

“How long?” Liam asks.

“How long what?”

“In your head, how long is it gonna take me to recover from all my mental shit?” Liam demands. “Or even start to cope with it better? Brett, dude, I know I’m fucking losing it. But if we get out on the road and we’re away from people, I’ll be okay. It was just the city and the Keepers and Owen and Vinnie-”

“You aren’t losing it-”

“I am fucking losing it!” Liam yells. “I had a nightmare so bad in the RV the other night Hayden had to pull over and let you sort me the fuck out, because I didn’t know where I was or who I was with!”

“It doesn’t bother me-”

“It bothers me!” Liam exclaims. “I know you don’t care if I’m so wack I think I’m a fucking goat! But I do! Because even after Garrett died I held it together for years on my own when I was way younger and now I’m falling apart! I hate it! It’s like I don’t even know who I am anymore! Like - like someone else should be pulling this shit and not me, because this isn’t me. This isn’t me, Brett.”

His voice breaks. He looks away before Brett can see he’s crying. _Again._

There’s a pause, and then Brett moves a little closer to him, carefully. Giving Liam time to indicate he wants space. “Liam,” Brett says softly. “Hey.”

“What?” Liam snaps wetly.

“I do care,” Brett murmurs. “I do care. But not for the reasons you think I should, yeah? You’re right. I’d love you the same if you thought you were a goat. It might make sex a little weird-”

Liam chokes around a noise that can’t decide if it’s a sob or a laugh, and Brett smiles a little.

“But I’d love you the same. I… I care because…” Here, Brett stops; he must be thinking about how to phrase what he’s feeling. Liam knows that all too well. “I care because it’s bothering you. Because I really hate seeing you so unsure of yourself and struggling. And that’s why I want to go back to River’s End. Because you wouldn’t as much there.”

Liam clenches his jaw against the fresh onslaught of tears threatening to overwhelm him. Brett’s quiet for a moment.

“I’m sick of crying all the time,” Liam mutters, and he wants it to come out with bite in his voice, but he just sounds tired.

Brett shuffles again. “Can I touch you?” he asks hesitantly.

Liam nods, and he’s surprised when Brett envelops him in a full-bodied hug - he’s kneeling over Liam, and Liam’s head ends up underneath his chin, near his chest, with Brett’s arm around his shoulders and waist.

Liam shifts a little. They’re affectionate enough, but rarely like this - Liam’s not all that cuddly, and so it’s rare that they actually go to the effort of extended hugs outside sex. It feels a little strange, but the air around them is still and Brett’s heartbeat is comforting.

“We don’t have time to…”

“We have plenty of time,” Brett murmurs, stroking the back of his neck gently. “We’re not going anywhere anytime soon.”

“The radio-”

“Five minutes, Liam,” Brett says softly. “Just… let me hold you for five minutes.”

So Liam relaxes. It takes him almost a full minute to realise that he feels calmer just for this - just from letting Brett arch over him and hold him and, well, Liam feels almost like Brett’s trying to protect him. He doesn’t know how to break it to the guy that he can’t be protected from his own mind… but it doesn’t mean he won’t let Brett try.

Brett’s fingers sift through the shorter hairs on the back of his neck, and Liam sighs, shuffles closer. He feels Brett smile.

“Oh, suddenly you’re real cuddly, huh?”

“Shut up,” Liam mumbles, even as he fights the urge to somehow climb inside Brett’s skin and live there forever.

Brett sighs a little. “Listen,” he says softly. “You need to sleep tonight, okay?”

Liam balks at the idea. “No-”

“I know the nightmares are freaking you out and that they suck,” Brett murmurs, heading off his argument before he can even string it together. “But you need to rest. You aren’t gonna gain anything by forcing yourself to stay awake.”

He sighs. “I’ll try.”

They’re quiet for a moment; the radio, sitting nearby, is silent. Fudge sits and watches them, wagging his tail softly, licking Liam’s face when he turns his head.

“So,” Brett says softly. “Crunch time. We going back, or on to DC?”

Liam thinks about it long and hard. Going back… it really would take them weeks. He wants to, God, he does. But they won’t get there in time to help if something is amiss.

“They’d want us to go to DC,” he says. “And we won’t… there’s not enough time to help them.”

Brett closes his eyes, but he nods. And Liam knows that Brett is thinking what he is: that the people in River’s End have all their hopes pinned on Liam, Brett, and their arrival in DC to make a cure. And beyond that, people they don’t know - survivors elsewhere who are hoping for a cure. Up until Brett, this thing had a one hundred percent infection and mortality rate. The deadliest virus, by any measure, to be introduced to humans.

But now? Well, now the mortality rate is ninety nine point nine percent. And Liam’s looking at the point-one that’s missing.

“I’m going to hunt,” Liam says softly. “I’m gonna find some deer. We’ll stock up on meat here, treat it. Then get out on the road again.”

“Alright,” Brett says, without argument. “Sounds like a plan.”

~*~

Liam takes a working truck to the edge of the trees lining the road and goes in.

He’s oddly relaxed; he hates killing, but this is what he’s good at, and the plan of food, rest, move has given him a goal to work towards.

He’s away for a few hours. When he returns, he’s carting two large deer and a few rabbits. They can dry the meat so it won’t waste - maybe they can even have a hot meal tonight. Fudge won’t miss out either.

Brett and Hayden aren’t there when he arrives back; they went to local doctors’ offices to try and loot medical supplies. They have enough, plenty even, but it doesn’t hurt to be stocked up. Putting in the work now means they won’t have to scramble later.

A few days pass. They don’t bother clearing out the town; normally, that would be Liam’s plan, to clear the surrounding area totally of biters to avoid unpleasant and deadly surprises. But they aren’t staying. And there aren’t many biters anyway.

Liam feels functionality steal back to him in fits and starts. The second night, he has nightmares, but they don’t wake anyone up; the third, he sleeps through, almost fourteen hours. Hayden and Brett let him, and they don’t badger him when he continues to spend huge amounts of time resting.

He feels calmer. Steadier. At the back of his mind, there’s a growing sense of dread that his mental stability is contingent on almost total social isolation. But right now, that doesn’t matter; that can be something for future Liam to worry about. Present-day Liam is just really fucking glad he seems to be on the mend.

Brett cuts his hair for him again, the way he likes it - spiky and unkempt, generally. When he catches sight of Hayden’s expression afterwards, he scowls. “What?”

“I thought your haircut was an unfortunate accident,” she admits, and Liam huffs while Brett laughs.

“If you count my hands and a pair of scissors as an unfortunate accident, it probably is,” Brett teases. “I think he’s pretty.”

“I’m not _pretty_ ,” Liam grumbles. “Stars are pretty. Hayden is pretty. Kira and Malia are pretty. I’m a man, and I’m not.”

“Got all your feathers ruffled, huh?” Brett teases. “Also, on an arbitrary scale of physical attractiveness, Malia is definitely hotter than pretty.”

“If you say so,” Liam sniffs. “It’s not like I think about it.”

“At all?” Hayden asks curiously.

“Sorry,” Liam shrugs. “My eyes aren’t broken or anything. I can tell you’re pretty. I just, you know, want to fuck you about as much as I wanna fuck that lamp over there.”

“Some people are probably into that,” Brett muses.

“What? Porn?”

“Lamps, I think he means,” Hayden giggles.

“Oh yeah, there’s definitely someone. There’s always someone.”

He enjoys the odd bantering they have going on - he even sometimes likes it when Hayden and Brett gang up on him and make him splutter indignantly, mostly because it makes them both laugh. He loves Brett, but he’s starting to feel pretty affectionate about Hayden too - he wants her to be around. A part of his life for a long time. He’d be genuinely sad if she decided to move on.

He wants to stay longer, but they need to move - they’re going to be crossing through states known for their heat on their way to DC. The sooner they can get through and back to the cooler east coast, the better.

“The break pedal is your _friend_ , Liam,” Brett says, wincing as they fly over a pothole. “Not your enemy. The potholes aren’t personal challenges.”

“I know that,” Liam mutters, then promptly peels around a bend so hard Brett clutches the dashboard.

“Honestly,” he says weakly. “This isn’t Grand Theft Auto. Slow down a little.”

He eases off the speed gently. So he’s still grasping breaks. That’s fine. He’ll get the hang of it - and hopefully not terrify anyone to death in the process. Or, you know. Crash.

At Brett’s feet, the radio gives a brief burst of static. It’s done it a few times - Liam doesn’t want to think about what it might mean for River’s End. For them, on the off-chance they pull this off for long enough to have something to go home to.

“How many miles to DC?” Brett asks softly.

“One thousand, nine hundred and ninety nine,” Liam replies.

“Which is…?”

He does some mental math. “Thirty ish hours. If we drive fast, don’t stop, don’t run into obstacles, take main roads…”

“Right.” Brett rubs his face. “So…”

“So we keep driving.”

Keep driving. Like it’s going to be that easy.


	31. Chapter Thirty One - What's Left

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> lol hi
> 
> this chapter is shorter than usual but i figure it's better to post now rather than never right? i'm sorry if it's crap D:
> 
> thank you for all the patience and encouraging words! it means the world <3

**Chapter Thirty One - What's Left**

**Liam's P.O.V**

“Who’s this?”

Liam looks up. Hayden’s standing there, a pair of Liam’s jeans in one hand and a photo in the other. She’s taken to cleaning all their laundry - “you guys might not mind smelling like gym socks, but I do-” and she’s apparently efficient enough at it to check their pockets.

He moves closer. He’s just out of a shower - another place with a backup generator, working water that isn’t stagnant as long as you run it for five minutes before getting in. He’s not wearing a shirt. For a second, he catches sight of himself in the mirror.

He’s lean. Not in a good way. Kind of ribby, really, with collarbones prominent in the way that makes them sensitive to Brett biting on them. But the bruises are gone, and his hair is finally back to being blonde after washing it a few times. He blinks. He barely recognises himself.

“Liam?”

“Sorry.” He takes the photo from her, flips it over, and swallows.

It’s the photo of the family they encountered just outside River’s End. Liam still remembers how defeated they looked, even then. Remembers that they just wanted somewhere to… end.

“This family,” he says softly. “I was part of the lead scouting team back at River’s End with three other people. We were out looking for evidence of Oakridge somewhere. Thought maybe if we could find them, they’d be allies.” He shakes his head. “We found this family. They were trying to get to Oakridge too, only they’d been bitten, all of them, and they were just… looking for somewhere quiet to finish it.”

Hayden swallows; Liam hears it.

“The woman gave me this photo of them,” Liam explains, his throat tight. “Asked me if I found Oakridge to put it somewhere nice, so that they sort of made it somehow. I forgot I had it.”

“That’s so sad,” Hayden mumbles tearfully.

“I just…” Liam shakes his head. “We found loads of people. But they were bitten or injured, couldn’t make it back, didn’t want to come… feels like I only ever got there in time to watch them die, not save them.”

“You got to me,” Hayden says.

“And me,” Brett’s voice adds quietly behind him. “Wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t knocked me over the head and dragged me to safety.”

Hayden looks at Liam bemusedly. “You what?”

“You think I’m high-strung now, you should’ve seen me a year ago,” Liam mutters.

“You knocked him over the head?”

“After saving me from a pack of biters,” Brett clarifies. “I was passing through. Liam here thought I was either insane or fucking lucky-”

“Didn’t think, knew, and both,” Liam interrupts.

“And felt sorry enough for me to save me from zombies, then drag me away. When he realised I didn’t have anything to survive the night with, he took pity on me. Brought me back to his little hidey hole. Fed me, got me warm-”

“You make it sound like I’m your mother.” Liam shrugs a shirt on. “I did it because he’s hot,” he explains to Hayden, and she laughs.

“You still took a risk,” she says. “Taking him in.”

Liam turns to look at Brett. He knows he did, but now he can’t help but feel like it’s the best choice he’s ever made, inviting Brett into his life and letting his spot in it grow roots into everything else. And, God, it’s going to hurt like fucking hell if those roots are torn from him in the event of Brett’s death - it’s something he got a taste of in River’s End, and he knows now he couldn’t do it. Not at all.

Brett smiles at him - the softer one that’s reserved for Liam and Liam only.

“He’s okay,” Liam grumbles, and they both laugh this time.

“There you go, Hayden,” Brett says, bumping Liam’s shoulder teasingly. “Ringing endorsement. I’m okay.”

“The way he talks, you’d think he doesn’t even like you,” Hayden giggles.

“Yeah, but that just makes him easy to rile up.” With that, Brett ruffles his hair. “Isn’t that right?”

“Fuck off,” Liam mutters, and they both laugh as if on cue.

~*~

They stay in the next town for almost a week - a strange chill has settled over most of Wyoming, it seems, even at the tail-end of summer. Liam hunts, gathers food, teaches Hayden how to salt it and treat it so it goes dry and stays good.

_Owen taught me that_ , he thinks. Owen’s… betrayal, or whatever it was - is still weighing heavily on his mind. That, and that he probably would have killed Brett, given the chance.

The thought burrows under his skin - the thought that he could trust someone implicitly just because he’d been able to before, and it could lead to Brett’s death - and he looks up, across the fire, to where Brett’s whittling away at a piece of wood.

With a soft grunt of annoyance, Liam gets up, ambles over, and settles down so close to Brett he’s almost on his lap. He ignores Hayden smiling widely, and doesn’t address the slight huff of amusement Brett makes either.

He sits there for long enough, glaring down at his book through his glasses, that Brett puts his carving away and lifts his arm to sling around Liam’s shoulders - and just like that, the annoyance at their affection Liam’s been so carefully cultivating goes right out of him.

“So, Grumpy,” Brett says lightly, and Liam scowls half-heartedly at him, “what’s the plan?”

“The plan is to take the most direct road,” Liam says, “which is still the 191, and I’m not grumpy.”

“And after that? Yes you are.”

“After that…” Liam hesitates. After that, he hasn’t thought ahead. He’s so used to anticipating trouble, at this point, that coming up with a solid plan is difficult. He knows he should have one, or that they should all work on one - the fog of uncertainty and indecision that settled over them in Idaho was nearly their undoing - but he just… can’t.

_I still don’t feel safe_ , he realises, and he’s back to being annoyed - genuinely annoyed, this time, with himself, and not with anyone else.

“I don’t know,” he says shortly, then stands up and goes to sit away from the fire - almost as far as he can get, on the very edge of the circle that separates him from the darkness and the light. Fudge follows him, tail down, as if sensing that something is wrong. He probably can.

He pretends not to notice Brett and Hayden exchanging worried looks. Irritation is his standard response to fear at this point - because last week’s night terror episode not only left him shaken, but embarrassed and angry at himself - but they both seem to have realised that it’s a cover.

When the moon has climbed almost to its highest point in the sky, Liam throws in the towel and goes to bed. Brett and Hayden don’t try to stop him.

~*~

He wakes up panting and sweating like he’s run a half marathon, and, to his bewilderment, he’s sitting up - maybe he jerked awake suddenly, or he sat up as he woke.

The nightmare lingers. Theo’s voice taunting him. The Keeper - Doug - holding him down. He clenches his eyes shut, tries to count backwards from ten, but he keeps whiting out at seven and getting lost in the memories.

“Liam?”

Brett’s sitting up next to him, doe-eyed and tousle-haired from sleep. His chest is bare - so is Liam’s - and Liam watches the slow shift of his muscles in the moonlight. He hasn’t been sleeping long, which would explain the exhausted vertigo washing over him.

“Nightmare,” Brett says. It isn’t a question. “What-”

“Nothing new,” Liam snaps, then curls in on himself, feeling ashamed and desperately scared. He thought he had the whole lashing-out-at-people-I-love thing under control, but he’s done it so often recently he’s wondered if he’s always been like this and he’s just neglected to remember it.

Brett’s hand rests tentatively on his shoulder, and, when Liam doesn’t flinch, begins to rub gently. Liam wants to tell Brett what he’s feeling and why he’s acting like a colossal prick, but when he opens his mouth to try, the words get stuck like molasses and choke him until he lets out a quiet, defeated sound that isn’t quite a whimper, but is way too close to it for his liking.

Brett slides out of bed, and Liam hears something - liquid being poured into a plastic cup. He’s surprised that the memory of the sound is so sharp in his head when all his water has come from rivers or lakes or water bottles for the last three years.

Brett comes back, sits on the edge of the bed, and hands him the cup. It’s a full moon, and Liam watches the light reflect off the water in it - if he lets the outside world fade away for a little, he can almost remember the sound of California’s beaches at night.

“Drink,” Brett says softly, and Liam does, slowly. Water helps. It’s always helped - when he was burning with fever after getting stabbed and Brett got him into the bath to cool him down, when he was stressed out after a day of foraging and killing zombies and he and Brett would go down to the natural pools to get clean. Drinking it, in the aftermath of nightmares, like he can physically wash them away.

His legs are outstretched underneath the covers, and he lowers the cup until it’s between his knees. He doesn’t look at Brett, but Brett’s looking at him.

“I don’t mind,” he says eventually.

“I do,” Liam replies, only just avoiding making it snappish and mean.

“I know. But I don’t. At least absolve yourself of that.”

The sweat is cooling on his skin - he feels sticky and cold-hot and headachy and almost feverish. Not like himself, or anything remotely resembling himself. A ghost in the machine.

“Liam,” Brett says. “Come back.”

Liam hates himself for it, but Brett’s voice is his anchor and he does as he’s told - closes out the nightmares and the shame and self-hatred and curls forward to lean his head tiredly against Brett’s shoulder. Brett sighs as he drops his head down on top of Liam’s, his hand curling around the back of his neck.

“It’s okay to ask for help,” he says.

“I’m tired,” Liam replies exhaustedly. “I want to sleep better.”

“I know. It’s been getting easier.”

“Not enough. I feel sick.”

“Sick?” Brett’s lips touch his forehead. “You aren’t hot…”

Normally, Liam would make a quip about that - be faux-offended until Brett fucked him to prove to him that he is. Now, he just says, “Not like that. I’m just… I feel sick.”

He wonders if Brett understands the way Tamara did, when he went to her months ago and told her that he didn’t feel well; there was nothing physically wrong but he felt like a hole had been punched into his chest and that he was slowly bleeding out.

“Sick, huh?” Brett murmurs.

Liam nods into his shoulder; he feels tired again.

“Okay,” Brett murmurs. “Lie down.”

Liam finishes his water and lies down - turns on his side with Brett coaxing him to. It’s only after he’s settled that he realises he’s near the window, now, and that Brett is between him and the door and even Hayden, who’s crashed out on the couch.

Brett spoons up behind him, splays a hand out over Liam’s belly, and starts to rub it gently. “Go to sleep,” he whispers. “If you’re sick I’m right here.”

Brett knows he isn’t sick. Brett probably realised he wasn’t right after he tested Liam’s temperature. _If he’d believed it_ , Liam realises, _he never would’ve turned me away from the edge of the bed. Not if he thought I was gonna throw up._

But he’s letting Liam pretend, and Liam’s grateful for that - he turns enough to press a kiss into Brett’s jaw, then goes lax in his arms, curled up and feeling safe and soothed.

“Love you,” he says muzzily, and Brett’s arms tighten. “Love you, Brett.”

He hears Brett swallow. “Love you too, Li.”

~*~

When he wakes in the morning, he actually feels rested.

Brett’s awake - he’s not quite spooning Liam anymore; he’s rolled onto his back, and his left arm is pinned underneath Liam, but his right is holding a book awkwardly in the air. Reading, Liam supposes.

“Mornin’,” Liam mumbles groggily.

“Hey.” Brett puts the book down. “Sleeping beauty.”

Liam’s mouth is gummy and sour and he’s prickling all over with sweat and his hair is greasy. He’s not beautiful in the slightest, but Brett’s looking at him like he means it, in a fondly teasing kind of way.

“Need a shower,” he mumbles.

Brett smiles. “Think we both do, buddy.”

The motel they’re staying in doesn’t have running water, like some places do, but it hardly matters. A bath is good enough to get clean in, and they can warm the water over the fire.

It feels good to be clean, finally; they debate about staying another day in whatever blink-and-you’ll-miss-it town they’ve ended up in this time, but they decide to keep moving. Really, Liam muses, they shouldn’t be stopping at all, except to refuel.

The radio hasn’t made any more noise. If it weren’t for Brett hearing it as well, Liam would be sure he was going completely fucking crazy. As it is, he’s at least half-convinced he’s dragged Brett down with him. He wonders if PTSD is catching.

“Do you reckon there are rabbits around?” Brett asks him.

Liam looks up; he’s found an axe and is chopping up some wood for a fire. Maybe they can take it with them, stack it neatly somewhere in the RV.

“Maybe,” he says. “It’s pretty warm though. They’re out more when it starts to cool down a little bit.”

“Not as hot here,” Brett murmurs. “Idaho felt like a sauna compared to this.”

Liam remembers. It might be warm here - enough to make him consider finding shorts - but Idaho was a whole other level of hot. It couldn’t have been much over ninety, but the heat - combined with humidity and the airlessness of the inner city - was stifling. The heat was blistering there, the kind that steals your breath away the moment you go outside and sends prickles of sweat sweeping across your skin.

“Sucked,” Liam replies.

Brett gives him a worried glance. It’s true that Liam’s quiet - he doesn’t have much to say a lot of the time - but this week has taken it to a whole new level. Well, ever since they left Idaho, really.

“Uh,” he continues, because he can tell Brett’s gearing up to ask him the standard set of questions that come along with him being more laconic that usual. “I dunno. At least we aren’t freezing to death, right?”

“Don’t check out,” Brett replies.

Liam’s head jerks up; the piece of wood he was about to chop topples over in the wind that blows through. “What?” he demands.

Brett looks broken-open and terrified in a way Liam’s never witnessed before. He’s seen Brett look scared, but never like this - never like he’s seen the end of the world and knows it’s unavoidable, and hell, they’ve been there and done that.

“Brett?” he demands again.

“Don’t check out on me,” Brett pleads. “I’ve been thinking about - about Vinnie. And Owen. And Vinnie saying that he’s only alive because Owen forces him to be, and I don’t - I’m selfish, okay? I can’t do this without you and if you check out on me, if you leave-”

Liam drops the axe and reaches out, grabs the front of Brett’s shirt, and yanks him in to kiss him. He kind of marvels at the way Brett stumbles, off-guard, bigger than him but so pliant and trusting and willing under his hand. Liam’s harsher than Brett by a long shot - gentleness and understanding aren’t built into him the way they are Brett. He can learn, for people he loves, but-

“Liam?” Brett mumbles against his mouth.

Liam steps back a little, licks his lips, feeling breathless. “I’m not checking out on you,” he says fiercely. “I’m fucked up, but I’m not suicidal. I’m not going anywhere. I’m gonna get you to DC and they’re gonna make a cure and we’re gonna be fine. End of story.”

“Vinnie-”

“That’s different,” Liam snaps. “Vinnie wanted to check out almost as soon as the whole thing started. He just did what he was told. I told you before. I don’t want to die. I want to live.”

“That was almost a year ago-”

“And nothing’s changed.” That’s a lie; everything’s changed, but Liam goes on anyway. “Look, Brett - I’ve been beaten up and stabbed and nearly raped and chased by zombies and I’m really psychologically fucked up, six ways from Sunday, I’ll give you that. But I’m still here. And I wouldn’t be anywhere else.”

There’s a long pause. Brett steps closer to him, presses his forehead against Liam’s, and that’s when Liam notices him crying.

The guilt crushes him, needles its way into his heart and makes his chest ache coldly. Brett didn’t sign up for this when he met Liam, but this is what he got anyway, and a lot of people would’ve left by now.

“I’m sorry I can’t pretend to be more normal,” Liam says. “Or even just be normal. I’m not sure I ever have been. I know you’re trying to help me but damn, Brett, you aren’t - you aren’t a shrink, or a doctor. You don’t… I don’t expect you to fix me.”

“You are normal,” Brett mumbles helplessly into his skin; he’s leaning on Liam like he can’t physically hold himself up. “Maybe a different normal. But… I told you, ages ago. The IED, and everything else… doesn’t make you not normal, it…”

He stops talking. Liam realises that he’s just lost the energy; he can’t find the words, and he’s exhausted, and Liam can empathise with that a little too much. He wraps his hand around the back of Brett’s neck.

“Sorry,” Brett whispers, and his breath hitches tiredly over what must be a sob. “I’m sorry.”

“Jesus, dude, what for?” Liam whispers back. “It’s okay. Think you’ve kinda earned it, you know?”

Brett pulls away from him. “Where’s Hayden?” he asks, and Liam doesn’t know whether he’s supposed to ignore Brett’s tears or reach up and wipe them away. He just doesn’t know.

“I think - I think she’s out. Getting supplies.”

Brett’s hand catches his. “I really need…”

Liam waits, but he doesn’t finish.

“How ‘bout you show me?” Liam asks hesitantly. “I’ll do anything you want.”

It turns out Brett only wants one very simple thing - touch. Which is how Liam ends up spread out on the bed, legs open, Brett’s fingers inside him and his mouth around him. And he’s taking his time, too; Hayden could be back at any moment but every time Liam edges towards coming, Brett backs off.

He’s helpless. With Brett, he enjoys that - he can whimper and beg as much as he wants but he won’t be coming until Brett decides he can and there’s something really hot about that.

His thighs shake warningly; he gives Brett’s hair a tug. “Brett,” he moans. “Brett, I-”

Brett twists his fingers a little, up, sideways - Liam whites out, and it’s over.

~*~

They lie there on the bed for a little while; Liam moves to take care of Brett, but Brett waves him off, tugs him in close, and holds him, even when sweat turns their skin slick where they’re touching and the heat gets worse.

Eventually, they move. Liam doesn’t expect Brett to explain, so he’s surprised when Brett begins to talk, nervously - lets him stammer out a few half-sentences before interrupting, as gently as he knows how, “It’s okay. Whatever that was, whatever you needed… I’m happy, okay? To give it.”

Brett being unsure makes him nervous. He’s the unsure one. Brett’s the one who knows what’s going on; Liam just follows suit, does as he’s told. He doesn’t exactly mind it that way either; Brett’s better at planning ahead than him.

Brett gives him a small smile. “Yeah. I know. Thank you. Can’t always be easy not… knowing what I’m thinking, or understanding it.”

Liam scoffs. “I live with not knowing what I’m thinking or why every day. I think I can handle you.”

Like that, they’re back to a more normal equilibrium; Liam treats the meat Hayden brings back from a hunt, Brett does inventory. Hayden sleeps - they’re still sleeping in shifts and grabbing it whenever they can, still caught somewhere in between relaxation mode and survival mode. Liam doesn’t mind too much though. Despite all that, he feels a little better. Like himself, almost.

“Not feeling sick anymore?” Brett asks.

Liam looks up at him, only now remembering what he’d said the night before. “Oh. Uh, nah. I’m okay.”

“Alright.” Brett’s assessing him, but Liam knows he doesn’t have anything to hide, so he’s not worried.

Liam looks around a little. “How long d'you reckon we’ll stay here?” he asks.

Brett surprises him by rubbing his face tiredly and sighing. There are deep black bags under his eyes that Liam’s not sure can be fixed with any decent amount of sleep; he’s suddenly aware that Brett looks as exhausted as he feels.

“I dunno,” Brett says eventually. “I know we should go soon. I’m just…”

Liam watches him put his head in his hands again and swallows. “Tired?” he guesses timidly.

Brett looks up and smiles wanly. “That’s one word for it, sure.”

“I’ll do some more driving,” Liam offers.

“Liam-”

“What? It’s only going in a straight line. How hard can it be? And-” He tries for a joke here, because he wants Brett to cheer up a little - “It’s not like there are any poodles around, so-”

It works; Brett barks out a laugh and comes to sit next to him, puts an arm around his shoulders, and pulls him close to kiss his temple.

“Love you, Li.”

“Yeah, yeah, you too,” Liam mumbles back.

“I have to time it right. When you’re sleepy or you’ve just come, you don’t get all shy.”

“Well, it’s not like there’s any point being shy after you’ve come,” Liam mumbles, only a little flustered.

“You know what?” Brett’s smiling. “You’re actually right.”

“Nobody can be wrong all the time,” Liam reasons. “Hey, go get some sleep or somethin’. Hayden and I will keep a lookout.”

“Hayden’s still sleeping-”

“I’ll be okay on my own,” Liam assures him. “Besides, I’ve got Fudge. And Hayden will wake up soon.”

Brett hesitates, but Liam knows he’ll do it, because he looks thoroughly exhausted. So he’s not really surprised when Brett sighs, leans over to kiss his temple clumsily, and then leaves for bed.

“So,” Liam says to Fudge, who tilts his head curiously. “Wanna play Go Fish?”

~*~

_“They never involve us in decisions.”_

_Liam looks up at Garrett. He looks angry, and he’s glaring in the general direction of Owen, Vinnie, and a few of the other adults they’re travelling with._

_“We’re kids,” Liam says quietly. “Maybe that’s why.”_

_“I’m sixteen,” Garrett mutters moodily. “I should get a say, at least.”_

_Liam doesn’t say anything, even though there’s about a thousand reasons why they haven’t been included in the decision making that could be true; the adults are trying to work out where’s safe, they’re trying not to scare them, they don’t want them to be forced into anything… it goes on and on._

_“Maybe we will,” he says eventually. “Even if it’s just… whether or not we think it’s a good idea.”_

_“I wanna lead my own group of survivors,” Garrett says. “One day. That way I won’t be stuck with other people’s shitty decisions.”_

_Liam doesn’t think Owen and the rest make shitty decisions. Not yet anyway. They’ve done everything they can to keep everyone alive and it’s worked so far, so he doesn’t see what the problem is._

_He looks up to Owen; he’s a big guy, strong, pretty friendly, doesn’t seem afraid of anything. Liam knows he won’t get that big - he’ll be lucky if he breaks five-foot-six - but he does hope that one day he can at least not be a coward._

_“Would you come with me?” Garrett asks._

_“Huh?”_

_“Jesus, Liam. Listen.” Garrett smacks his leg. “If I had my own group. Would you come?”_

_“You would want me to?” Liam asks, feeling genuinely surprised._

_Garrett wrinkles his face. “I guess so.”_

_Liam deflates a little. It isn’t the resounding “yes, because I love you” he was looking for. And he’s fifteen, so expecting or wanting to hear Garrett say it - Garrett, of all people - is… well, kind of stupid, really._

_“Yeah. I’d come. Probably.” He’d follow Garrett anywhere, but he doesn’t want to be the one who feels more, so he plays it down._

_Garrett wrinkles his nose a little. “Probably?”_

_“Yeah…?”_

_“Huh. Okay.”_

_“Guys,” Owen calls. “C'mon. We’re going.”_

_“They say jump, we don’t even ask how high,” Garrett mumbles as they get to their feet. “I’m sick of it.”_

_“Mmm,” Liam says, and lets Garrett bitch about the others for the next half hour in total silence._

~*~

“What’re you thinking about?”

Hayden’s sitting down across from him, hair pulled into a ponytail and her eyes sleepy. Liam feels a little startled.

“Uh - nothing. Memories.”

“Don’t stay there long. You’ll get trapped.”

“Ain’t that the truth.” He passes her some meat. “Sleep okay?”

“Yeah. It’s nice travelling with people I can actually trust.” She spears some meat on a fork and looks around. “Brett?”

“Sleeping,” Liam says, still trying to shake off the memory of Garrett. “Looked like he needed it.”

“You do too, you know.”

“I always look like I need sleep. I have unhealthy coping mechanisms.”

She smiles. “Maybe you should get some, then.”

“I’m alright.”

“Go ahead.” She strokes Fudge’s head. “He’ll keep me company. I have food.”

“That is true,” Liam says, smiling. “He’d trade up anyone for a leg of lamb. Alright. Thanks.”

“Anytime.”

“Wake me up in an hour? I’m gonna get some scavenging done before it gets dark.”

“Sure.”

He finds Brett in the RV, curled up on the bed and sleeping soundly. Liam sighs tiredly as he joins him - he doesn’t even take his boots off, because he’s not gonna be here long anyway.

He settles in on his back, unsurprised when Brett senses his presence and gloms onto him like a limpet. It’s kind of nice, even if it is stuffy in the RV, dead air and no circulation whatsoever. Nobody’s ever really wanted him around like Brett has before.

He blinks up at the ceiling, remembering when Owen and Vinnie made all his decisions for him - including when he ate and slept and even pissed. He’d been fine with it, then, because he was a teenager and he hadn’t learned how to think independently, really; Garrett had, but that became part of the problem.

His life looks different now. He’s not really sure what fifteen year old Liam thought eighteen year old Liam would be doing, but he’s sure it isn’t this - sure it isn’t looking for a cure with his older boyfriend, a random scavenger he found, and a dog.

Not that that’s a bad thing. If he’d stayed with Owen and Vinnie, given where they ended up and how they ended up, he’d be dead. Or, worse - sold off to one of the Keepers.

His skin breaks out in a cold sweat; he shivers abruptly, closes his eyes. He doesn’t want to think about the Keepers. Not any of the faceless ones, not Theo, not Doug.

His heart throbs; he sits up, wipes his face, and blinks rapidly.

“Hey.”

He looks down; Brett’s peering up at him sleepily.

“You just got here,” he mumbles, tugging Liam’s shirt. “C'mon. Lie down again. Don’t go.”

Brett never really asks him for anything, so Liam doesn’t want to say no when he does. He lies down, surprised when Brett turns him onto his side and spoons him, arms tucked around his waist and face in the back of his neck.

“Hmm,” Brett mumbles. “Your skin’s cold. S'nice.”

“Yeah?” Liam can feel the memories of Doug loosening their grip on his mind. “Guess I’ll stay then.”

“For how long?”

“I dunno. An hour?”

“Stay forever,” Brett murmurs, and Liam’s throat constricts.

“Okay,” he whispers. “Yeah. I’ll stay forever.”

~*~

Hayden wakes him an hour later, like she promised, even though she looks reluctant to do so.

Liam’s bleary, having had too much sleep for a restorative nap and not enough sleep to count towards a decent rest. Still, he gets up, looks at his watch - a few hours of daylight, maybe; enough to hunt - and pulls on his weapons belt.

“Hunting?”

Brett’s awake and looking rested, the bastard. “Yeah,” Liam says. “Before sundown. Might be able to catch something.”

“Can I come?” Brett asks.

Liam blinks. “Hunting? Sure. Why?”

“I need to learn, I think,” he murmurs, sitting and reaching for his boots. “It’s not fair on you and Hayden to have to do it all the time.”

Liam shrugs. Brett’s their medic; apart from other obvious reasons, Liam would rather not have him on the frontline. Risking their only even mildly knowledgeable medical person seems stupid when there are two of them who can hunt.

“Be careful,” Hayden says as they leave. “It’ll be dark soon.”

“We’ll head back when the light gets bad,” Brett promises, but Liam’s already beginning to head to the truck they’ve been using around town. He’s in hunting mode, now, and when he’s like this he doesn’t do much other than scan for tracks and movement.

“So,” Brett says, hopping down from the cab and hitting the ground lightly. “What’s step one?”

Liam smiles a little; the moment they set foot into the underbrush, he can hear Brett crashing along behind him, probably scaring off any game with even an iota of sense. “First,” he says, “you gotta be quiet.” He gestures at Fudge. “Look how he’s moving.”

Fudge knows they’re hunting; they don’t venture into the woods unless they are, and Liam’s got his crossbow half-cocked and ready. These are things that Fudge has learned indicates a hunt; he’s picking his way quietly through the grass and over the leaves, tail down and ears pitched forward.

“Right.” Brett’s footsteps become softer; he’s bigger than Liam, so quietness is harder, but he’s managing. “What else?”

“Tracks. You’ll see tracks before movement.” Liam scans the ground. “There.”

Hoofprints. Small; a female or a baby, probably. Not big game. Fudge sniffs them, looks at Liam, and gives a soft, gentle huff.

“Means they’re fresh,” Liam explains. “I taught him some stuff. He can find rabbits and biters too, so pay attention to what he’s doing.”

They’re quiet for a moment. Brett’s still behind him, watching, following where he walks. There are tracks; deer, within a mile of them. If they’re fast enough…

A twig snaps, ahead of them; Liam sinks into a crouch as Fudge lowers his tail and front legs to the ground, ears pricked forward eagerly, breathing stilled.

A moment later, it appears - a deer, fully mature, toeing carefully through the underbrush. For a moment, Liam’s amazed by her gracefulness - the way she instinctively knows where to step, the swivel of her ears as she listens, the twitch of her nose following the air.

_Maybe we should’ve let the damn virus wipe us out,_ he thinks. _Maybe it was supposed to._

She steps again, and Liam remembers they have to eat that night - he fires his crossbow, striking her between the eyes. At least it’s a clean, painless kill.

He stands. Brett follows suit, and Fudge trots forward, sniffing around the body.

Liam follows him over, leans down, and examines the arrow. It’s embedded now, unsalvageable. He probably could save them if he was willing to shoot for his prey’s lungs or heart; he isn’t, and he’d rather just make more bolts.

“I hate killing,” he says softly.

Brett’s quiet for a moment. Then, “Thank you.”

Liam nods. “Help me haul it back?”

“Sure.” Brett grabs the hind legs, leaving Liam with the lighter front end - something that doesn’t escape his notice. He scowls a little.

“You’re still healing,” Brett says. “I can handle it.”

“I’m not a baby.”

“Nope. Just my boyfriend who makes it necessary to pathologically worry about him.”

Liam sighs; he lets go of the deer’s front legs when they reach the road, wiping the sweat from his forehead. He’s more used to summer than winter, but it presents its own set of challenges - like much more limited drinking water.

“Yeah,” he says uncomfortably. “Sorry.”

“Look, Liam, it… it’s not that I’m trying to coddle you or anything, I…”

Liam’s not listening. He’s looking at the ground, and he’s noticing a pattern in the leaves scattering the edge of the road - they’re squashed, disturbed, leading west. Too big to be a deer, and there aren’t bears around here, so…

“Liam?”

“Shh,” Liam says testily, kneeling down.

“Look, this is something we need to-”

“Shut up,” Liam hisses. Finally, Brett seems to get that he’s looking for something and falls silent.

Liam looks around. The trees are eerily quiet; there are no birds, no sound, no nothing. The hairs on the back of his neck stand up as he looks at the tracks - leading west, but never veering away from the leaves.

“There’s someone here,” he mutters to Brett lowly.

“Wait, what?” Brett demands in a whisper.

Liam stands still for a moment, straining his hearing. The tracks on the ground are fresh, evenly spaced, and clear - the person was walking slowly, carefully.

“There’s someone here,” Liam repeats uneasily. “Someone else. Maybe only one, but…”

“But someone,” Brett finishes anxiously. “Can you tell-”

Liam tilts his head. “Older,” he says. “Male. Not a huge guy, maybe a little taller than me. No blood… he’s not injured.” Liam cocks his head. “He could have killed us,” he murmurs. “He was less than fifty yards away… he didn’t. Why?”

“We cleared this town,” Brett says. “There’s no one else-”

“Footsteps,” Liam says, pointing to them. “See that? Adult male, walking slow to avoid being noticed, bigger than me but not as big as you. A bear’s tracks would be bigger and deer don’t wear boots.”

“Maybe he didn’t kill us because he doesn’t have a weapon,” Brett says.

“No weapon?” Liam asks incredulously. “No. He must have one.” He shakes his head. “Maybe not a gun?” he asks himself. “Not long range?”

“Where did he go?” Brett asks.

Liam points. “That way.” He shakes his head. “Doesn’t matter. Let’s get the fuck out of here. We’re leaving.”

“The town?” Brett asks. “Liam-”

Liam rounds on him. “He didn’t kill us this time but that doesn’t mean he won’t, and I didn’t notice him, and Fudge didn’t notice him. He’s good at sneaking and if we didn’t know he was here before we sure as shit won’t know where he is later. We’re going.”

“Alright.” Brett looks unhappy about it, but he concedes. “Let’s go then.”

They haul the deer carcass into the bed of the truck, then hop in. Liam sits forward, hand in Fudge’s ruff, staring out at the road suspiciously.

“Doesn’t make sense,” he murmurs.

“What doesn’t?”

“None of it. I didn’t notice he was here-”

“You’ve been tired-”

“I’m sleepy, not mentally deficient, I’ve noticed way more on a lot less energy-”

“But that’s-”

The rest of Brett’s sentence is swallowed in the resounding crack of a gunshot; Liam ducks instinctively, expecting the glass of the windows to shatter inwards, for there to be bloodshed, an unexpected tragedy, anything. The brakes squeal as Brett slams on them.

They sit in the road. The windows are intact; the only sound is their breathing. Fudge whines.

“That could’ve been Hayden,” Brett says shakily. “We should get back.”

“Go,” Liam says shortly.

~*~

Hayden is fine - worried sick about them, but fine.

“I heard a gunshot,” she says when they arrive, hugging Liam first and then Brett. “Was it-”

“Wasn’t us,” Liam says. “We aren’t alone. There’s someone else here and we need to fucking go before they find us.”

“They might not be bad-”

“They also might be a fucking psycho,” Brett points out softly. “Can’t risk everything on a maybe, Hayds.” He opens the bed to the truck, turns to Liam. “You got this? I’m gonna go get some of the stuff from the hotel-”

“Go, I got it,” Liam says, busying himself with the deer. “Hayden-”

“I’ll get the RV ready.”

Liam’s so busy with the deer he doesn’t notice time passing. By the time he does, it’s only because Fudge is turning in circles and whining.

“What’s up?” he asks, and then looks around - Hayden is nearby, with the RV, but Brett-

Brett, he realises, and the blood drains from his face and leaves his hands and toes, leaving him icy and clammy with a scared sweat. _I should’ve seen Brett by now-_

He grabs him crossbow and leaves, heading down the front of the complex first and peering into the rooms. Brett isn’t in any of them, and he’s not out the front, and Liam’s freaking out - how the fuck has he lost his six foot three boyfriend? In a crowd of exactly no other people? How does that happen?

_There are no zombies here_ , he reminds himself, panicking. _He can’t get bitten or eaten because there are no zombies and you know that because you checked for them-_

_You checked for people too._

He rounds the corner - and runs almost right into Brett’s back.

Brett’s standing there, looking tense as hell but not really frightened, facing down a man with scruff on his cheeks and a wild, desperate expression in his eyes. There’s a rabbit tied to his belt.

The edge of the road, Liam realises. The trees. Perfect place to set snares for rabbits.

“Liam,” Brett says, turning a little. “You’re - look, put the crossbow down, okay?”

Liam glares silently. Like hell he’ll put the crossbow down.

He looks around. The window to one of the nearby buildings is open, and Liam’s blood goes colder than it already was - he was close, he was so close, and they didn’t know-

“Jensen,” the man says.

“What?” Brett asks.

“My name. Jensen. You asked.”

“Right,” Brett says, almost blankly, and there’s silence for a moment.

Jensen swallows. “Does he talk?” he asks Brett, jerking his chin at Liam.

“Sure,” Brett says agreeably. “Just not to strangers.”

Liam squints, a little annoyed. He’s not a fucking kid, and yet here they are - Liam’s got the crossbow but Brett’s between him and Jensen, and he’s compensating for the man’s every movement, making sure it stays that way.

“Bit young for a crossbow,” Jensen says nervously.

Liam wants to snap, but something’s wrong. He’s looking around, and the set of Jensen’s feet suggests he was trying to avoid Brett - trying to go. This man was trying to leave, even though he has a gun, even though he had a strategic advantage inside the building.

_He could’ve sniped us_ , Liam realises. _He didn’t. Why didn’t he? Did he think there were more of us?_

Jensen looks at his feet, seemingly unnerved by Liam’s steady gaze on him.

_He’s holed up in a building_ , Liam thinks. _He’s had time to set traps and snares for rabbits, which means he’s been here at least a day. We’ve been stomping around longer than that, leaving tracks, because we thought this place was empty… and if he’s survived this long, he’s smart enough to know that there’s only three of us and Fudge._

_So why the secrecy?_

“Liam,” Brett says. “I think you can lower the crossbow now.”

But he doesn’t. Something doesn’t add up - this man, on his own, in an easily defensible position with the advantage of surprise, had nothing to lose by attacking them. He didn’t, which means one of two things - he’s bait for a larger group of people, or he’s hiding something.

Liam searches him. He’s thin, but not emaciated, and despite the fact that he’s obviously scared, he’s steady and almost calm. Nobody under the Keepers’ control acts like this; they don’t respect the lives of their slaves enough to ensure they’re well fed.

“Where’s your family?” Liam asks brusquely.

The man jolts a little where he stands, obviously surprised to hear him speak. “What?”

“You’re not here alone, but you aren’t with a large group,” Liam says. “You’re worried about attacking us because you don’t want to risk not killing us and leading us to your family - who I’m assuming are hurt or sick or can’t run, because otherwise you wouldn’t be holding down the area. So where are they?”

Jensen looks at him for a moment, terrified, and then drops his hands to rub at his face. “Look,” he pleads, “I don’t want any trouble. You didn’t shoot me on sight - my family needs me. I need to get back to them-”

“We aren’t bad people,” Brett says softly. “We’re not going to hurt you unless you hurt us.”

“Tell him that,” Jensen says, gesturing at Liam.

“He’s all bark,” Brett replies. “Liam, Jesus, put the crossbow down.”

Liam lowers it reluctantly, continuing his staredown of Jensen. He knows it unnerves people - to have a silent teenager not take their eyes off them in the middle of a conflict.

“My daughter is sick,” Jensen says softly. “We just want a place to hole up and help her get better. We thought this place would have medicine.”

“It’s been picked clean,” Brett says softly. “Was when we got here.”

“Brett,” Liam says.

Brett turns to him.

“We have medicine,” he murmurs, so only Brett can hear him. “We could… try to help?”

Brett nods. “It might not be the right stuff.”

“Does that mean we shouldn’t try?” Liam asks softly.

Brett tilts his head, a concession, and then turns to Jensen. “Look,” he says. “I know we only just met. And that you really have no reason to trust us, especially around your family. But I know a little about medicine, and we have enough. We’d like to help.”

Jensen opens his mouth, then closes it. “How can I trust you?” he asks.

“Brett saved my life,” Liam says, taking a small step forward. “I got really sick. I almost died. I didn’t because he knew what to do. I’m not smart, and I can’t really help. But he can.”

Jensen looks between them. Liam feels for him - he’s clearly torn, and without medicine his daughter might die, but they’re strangers. In his shoes…

_If it was Brett_ , Liam thinks, _I would do anything. Even if it meant trusting a stranger._

“How?” Jensen asks warily.

Liam hesitates. He doesn’t like showing people his scar - his weak point, the result of one of the worst periods of his life. So far, it’s his closest brush with death.

He caves, though. Lifts his shirt, turns so that the light glints off the white, marbled skin on his torso. It sticks out; it’s clearly a new scar, not like some of the ones on his hands and arms.

“What is that?” Jensen asks.

Liam almost sighs. How many times are they gonna go over it? “Stab wound,” he says.

“Entered and glanced off his ribcage, missed his lung and stomach, severed muscles in his chest wall and left him nearly crippled from pain,” Brett says softly.

Jensen looks at him in wonderment. “So how-”

“I got better,” Liam says stiffly. “Brett stopped the infection from spreading with antibiotics. He knows what he’s doing.”

“And you think you can help my daughter?”

This time, it’s Brett who hesitates. “Look,” he says. “I’m not a doctor. I can only try. But that’s gotta be better than nothing, surely?”

“Yeah,” Jensen sighs. “It is.”

~*~

He isn’t holed up far away, it turns out; they follow him, Liam behind a little, watching their backs. The utter silence is unnerving; even the birds are being quiet.

“I didn’t really fix you,” Brett says softly.

“Huh?” Liam mutters distractedly.

“Your side,” Brett says. “It was Dr. Deaton and Tamara who put you back together again.”

“If it hadn’t been for you,” Liam says, “I wouldn’t have been around to be put back together.”

Brett nods. “I hadn’t thought of it that way.”

“'Course not.” Liam turns a little. “This is wigging me out. Why’s it so fucking quiet? What have we missed?”

“I mean, there’s no people-”

“It’s not just that,” Liam interrupts. “Have you heard birds? Other animals? Fuck, the deer was the first thing we’ve seen in ages that’s alive, and it was in the woods. Something’s not right.”

“Maybe the zombies ate all the animals?”

“Zombies can’t catch birds. Maybe rabbits, but birds?”

“This way,” Jensen says, and leads them into a warehouse. Shit hiding place, Liam thinks dully, remembering the time he sent Brett, Owen and Vinnie into one to hide. Too exposed. Too open. Could be biters around every corner.

Owen and Vinnie. His stomach clenches. He almost misses them. Misses their security.

“Grace?” Jensen calls.

Liam blinks. They’re standing outside an office door - he can’t tell if he’s disassociated or been daydreaming. He doesn’t think he’s disassociated. It doesn’t feel like that, anyway. He’s aware of time passing.

The door opens. The woman on the other side - Grace, Liam guesses - is tall, but frail and thin with apparent malnutrition.

Liam almost stops breathing; resting on her hip is a little boy, no older than three, watching them all with frightened eyes and beginning to whimper.

Liam doesn’t really think. He bends down to the kid’s eye level, smiles, and says, “Boo.”

The kid smiles, giggles.

“Jensen?” Grace asks warily. “Who are these people?”

“They’re going to help,” Jensen says breathlessly. “They’ve got medicine. For Hannah-”

“Jensen, they could be-”

“Oh, come on.” He sounds vaguely pleading; he takes his wife’s arms in his hands. “Look. This one’s barely a teenager. They’re harmless.”

Liam’s eyebrows shoot up. _First mistake_ , he thinks. _Assuming someone’s harmless because they’re young. Anyone alive now is alive because they know the ropes._

“We won’t hurt anyone,” Brett says softly.

_You won’t,_ Liam thinks idly. _The moment Jensen moves a hair out of place I’ll fucking shoot him._ Still, he smiles right along with Brett’s words.

He notices, then, another kid - a little girl, sitting by a lamp and looking scared. Behind her, another one is wrapped in a sleeping bag - the sick one, he guesses by the heavy breathing.

“How old?” Brett asks softly.

“Three, five and eight,” Grace says quietly.

Which would mean the little boy was born either right before the outbreak - or during it. They’re so little, Liam realises, his heart in his throat. Three children - eight, five and three. It’s too young. Too young to be out here.

He thinks of Savannah, who was barely three when her parents made their way to River’s End, who doesn’t know what zombies even really look like. She’s never been outside the walls again.

“How?” he hears himself asking.

Jensen and his wife - Grace? - look at him. “We don’t know,” she says, seeming genuine. “We got lucky. It’s how we’re still here.” She gives him a hesitant smile. “Sit down?”

He folds himself onto the floor, thoroughly surprised when the youngest kid clambers upright and totters over to him curiously.

“Tyler,” Grace scolds.

“He’s okay.” Liam holds out his arms, and Tyler heads straight for him, using Liam’s knees to balance. Liam - sitting there, surrounded by children and adults who are much, much weaker and more vulnerable than him - feels like a giant, with Tyler’s chubby hand gripping his wrist for support.

Brett turns around. “I think she has pneumonia,” he says quietly. “The good news is we have meds for that - enough for a full course.”

“What if you need them?” Grace asks, after a long pause.

Brett smiles ruefully. “I’ve done my dash with pneumonia. Liam doesn’t seem to be affected by it, at least, not yet. Besides.” He shakes his head. “We’ve lived longer.”

“I’m hard to kill,” Liam offers up. “Like a cockroach.”

“Don’t tempt fate, Li.” Brett’s popping a pill out of a blister packet. “Although,” he admits, “he is right. A few people have tried. He’s basically unkillable.”

“Really?” Grace asks.

“I’ve been shot, stabbed, infected with a deadly disease, chased by a herd of walkers, almost captured by cannibals, fallen through ice, chloroformed, and survived a car crash,” Liam recites off the top of his head.

“Now that you mention it, that list is disturbingly long,” Brett mutters.

“Stabbed?” Jensen asks, visibly horrified.

“It’s fine now,” Liam reassures them, smiling when Tyler motions that he wants to be picked up. “Fuck, he’s cute. Uh…” He winces. “Sorry.”

They both laugh. “How old are you?”

“Liam’s eighteen,” Brett says absently. “I’m… fuck, must be twenty two now. Getting old.” He turns to them with a weary smile. “Been a long time out here.”

Jensen nods. “We can understand that,” he murmurs. “How long have you been out?”

“Outside… protection?” Brett asks. “Without a group?”

Jensen nods.

“Me, I’ve been on my own or at least without a big group for… oh, a year, all together, on and off. Liam’s longer. Two, almost three. How about you guys?”

Jensen shakes his head. “We can’t stay anywhere long,” he says softly. “Three kids, and not a lot of skill between us - we’re not worth the risk or burden for communities to take in, and the ones that we’ve been in have fallen pretty quickly to stronger ones.”

“You must be able to do something,” Liam says. “You’re still alive.”

Jensen shakes his head. “Through luck. Nothing else. We stay in areas we can scavenge for food. Load up before we go anywhere.”

“You don’t hunt?” Liam asks.

“No.”

He nods, pulling his head to the side a bit when Tyler tries to stick his fingers into his ears. “I’ll show you,” he says.

“You will?”

“Yeah. Might be a bit of a learning curve… but everyone can learn. I did.”

“How?”

“I got hungry,” Liam says simply.

There’s silence. Liam remembers it; the first time he had to take down something to eat, it was a deer. A small one, and he got lucky, but it wasn’t a clean kill; he hadn’t eaten for four days and was wobbly and weak with a combination of exhaustion and summer heat, and when he saw it - roaming across the highway, completely out of place - he took the shot.

He had to snap its neck. He hit it, enough to wound it, but not to kill. He’s remembered it ever since. He remembers almost all of them. Never tells Brett that, or anyone - because Brett doesn’t need to worry about him more, doesn’t need the guilt.

Liam hands Tyler over to his mom. “I’m gonna go find Hayden,” he says shortly.

~*~

“Hey!”

He’s barely gotten a few feet from the building before Brett’s rushing out after him.

“What’s going on with you?” Brett asks, staring at him. “You were doing fine.”

Liam looks out to the trees. Everything’s silent. The air is still, and every hair on his body prickles with the unshakeable sense that something is horribly, terribly wrong.

“Liam,” Brett says, reaching out and grasping his shoulder. “Talk to me.”

Liam turns back to him. “Okay, I know I sound paranoid,” he begins, “but something isn’t right here, Brett.”

“Like what? Wasn’t it just that Jensen and his family were here?”

“No,” Liam says. “I thought so too but - no. Something isn’t right and it’s not them and it’s not us. It’s too quiet. Even back in Idaho there was noise and birds and wild animals, even though there were zombies around. There’s nothing left here, man. Nothing.”

“That’s all?” Brett asks, looking worried. “You freaked me out. Why not just say it in front of everyone?”

“Oh yeah, let’s tell the defenceless family with three little kids that I don’t think something’s right and let them watch as my spidey senses go haywire trying to figure out what, which, by the way, is never pretty.”

Brett winces. “Right.”

He knows Liam’s right, and Liam knows he knows it; he’ll get crabbier and more on edge the longer it takes him to work out what’s going on, and he’s not going to settle until he gets to the bottom of it.

“Liam,” Brett says softly. “It’s gonna be dark soon.”

“I’m not sleeping until I know what the fuck is going on,” Liam snaps.

“Suggestion,” Brett counters, “we don’t investigate what the fuck is going on and instead we just get out of here and keep heading to DC.”

“And that family?” Liam asks. “What about them? If we leave them here and something is wrong - if someone else is here and we’ve just gotten lucky or they’ve seen we’re packing but know Jensen and his family aren’t-”

“We aren’t leaving them here,” Brett interrupts. “We’ll take them with us. Find a community along the way, keep them safe.”

“We could send them to River’s End,” Liam says. “It’s safe with Logan gone.”

Brett shakes his head. “We don’t know what their situation is,” he whispers. “We don’t know why they tried to contact us on the radio. If we send them there, they might be walking straight into disaster.”

Liam rubs his face. “So what?” he asks. “They come with us? It isn’t safe.”

“No,” Brett agrees. “It isn’t. Not all the way to DC anyway. But maybe they can come with us for a while - we can find them somewhere safe along the way, drop them off. Make sure they’re alright.”

Liam nods. “Yeah. Alright. But we have to stay here for a bit then - we need more food for the road if we have five extra people, and maybe another car.”

“Okay.” Brett nods. “Sounds like a plan. How 'bout we relocate them to the hotel? Warmer, safer - if something happened, we could help out.”

“Hannah?” Liam asks. “Can she travel yet?”

Brett bites his lip. “In the RV, maybe,” he says. “I’d wanna look at her again first.”

Liam nods.

“Level with me, Li,” Brett murmurs. “Can we afford to stay another night, do you think?”

Liam considers it for a moment. Nothing awful has happened - yet. They have numbers on their side. There’s no zombies. He still has to skin and prep the deer. Leaving now, without direct threat of danger, seems illogical.

“One night,” he says curtly.

“Okay.” Brett looks relieved. “Get the truck. Let’s relocate them.”

~*~

Jensen and Grace allow themselves and their children to be relocated with the same kind of hapless trust Liam had in Owen and Vinnie when the outbreak first started.

It doesn’t take long - mostly, they just have to be careful of Hannah, who’s still having a tough time breathing. Eventually, though, the family is set up in the room next to Brett, Liam, and Hayden’s.

Hayden’s more than a little surprised at the five new additions, to say the least. Still, she’s good with the kids - smiles at them and is generally cute and non-threatening in the way only a teenage girl can be, and Liam feels a little more at ease knowing there’s three of them to protect the kids, plus their parents.

“Thank you,” Grace murmurs to them. “We…”

“Haven’t met good people in a long time,” Jensen finishes for her.

Liam’s quiet, but Brett speaks for them both when he says, “They’re around. Hard to find for sure… but they’re around.”

Hayden skins and preps the deer while Brett and Liam do last-minute stuff - Brett, a check-up of Hannah and the other kids, to make sure they aren’t sick as well; and Liam, pacing around the hotel, checking all the rooms and shutting the doors. For good measure, he sets some traps.

They say goodnight. Hayden’s asleep when they go in, curled up in her bed and dead to the world. Liam knows what that’s like - the bone-crushing exhaustion of being alive, of having to try and keep up with the world the way it is now. He knows.

The sheets are cool when they climb into bed. Brett’s on his back; Liam flops on his stomach contentedly, just wanting to be close. They don’t have to fuck or anything.

He’s drifting soon enough, but hyper-aware of the fact that Brett isn’t sleeping. His eyes aren’t even closed, when Liam opens his own to check.

“What’s up?” he asks sleepily, pushing a hand through his hair.

“Jensen and Grace,” Brett murmurs. “They got me thinking.”

Liam rises up on his elbows; crickets chirp quietly outside. “About what?”

Brett looks at him. “How I’d like to die.”

Liam nods thoughtfully. It doesn’t surprise him - Brett is the kind of person to really consider that kind of stuff, he knows. He’s smart, book-smart, full of knowledge and ideas Liam will probably never have on his own.

“I’d like to die fighting,” he says. “How 'bout you?”

Brett looks sad. “Me? I guess I’d like to die of old age.”

Liam takes a moment, lets that sink in. He’d never considered old age an option. He just kind of figured his death should be useful to someone.

He thinks. He made it to sixteen when the outbreak began. Made it to seventeen after Garrett died. Made it to eighteen after being stabbed, and now, he’s well on his way to nineteen. And he knows all these are flukes; that he got there with help and a hefty helping of dumb luck. But maybe it isn’t so farfetched to think he’ll make it to nineteen and twenty and twenty one; maybe it’s okay to want to live the amount of time he’s supposed to.

“Me too,” he says, and Brett gives him a warm, relieved smile.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Suddenly afraid, Liam reaches up and pushes Brett’s hair back. “But only if you’re there, okay? I don’t wanna live to a hundred if you’re gonna die at twenty five. So don’t.”

Brett’s face softens. “I’ll try not to.”

They’re quiet for a moment, just looking at each other.

Brett sighs, curls his hand around the back of Liam’s neck. “C'mere,” he murmurs, and Liam folds trustingly into his arms - kisses Brett when Brett’s neck arches up to meet him, parting his lips submissively when Brett licks into his mouth.

The sheets rustle. He hears their breathing, laboured, punctuated by small gasps and bitten-back moans. Brett’s hand palms at his boxers. Liam - who only ever feels truly safe when he’s being touched by Brett - arches, gasps into Brett’s mouth.

“Easy,” Brett whispers, and rubs him off soft and slow over his boxers until Liam’s shuddering and undulating and coming, and Brett swallows his moans with kisses. Hayden doesn’t stir.

“Get some rest,” Brett whispers to him, palming Liam’s cheek. “Okay? Wake me up if you have a nightmare, or can’t sleep.”

Liam nods; his eyelids are drooping. “Sticky,” he mumbles.

“Yeah, you’re gonna be sticky.” Brett’s voice is fond. “Deal with it in the morning, Li.”

“Mmkay.” He melts against Brett’s side. “Love you.”

“Love you too, Li.”

~*~

_“Liii-aaaam.”_

_He opens his eyes._

_The curtains blow in the wind. The room smells like the beginnings of spring, warm and earthy and like pollen and flowers. He blinks drowsily._

_“Liam.” There’s a hand on his shoulder; he rolls over._

_It’s his mom. She’s leaning over him, smiling softly, and pushes a hand through his hair as he rolls. He’s younger, much younger. Feels fourteen, maybe fifteen. Softer._

_“It’s almost noon.” She’s smiling; her eyes are blue and her hair a blondish-brown and she’s beautiful. Liam stares up at her, bewildered._

_“Sweetie?” she asks. “What’s wrong?”_

_“I had a nightmare,” he says blankly, sounding small and tinny to his own ears. He remembers it - the agony of a stab wound and the haze of waking up under anaesthesia and winter, lingering and horrible and ice-cold and the Keeper._

_“A nightmare?” she asks, smoothing his covers. “What about?”_

_He lies there and drinks her in. “Nothing,” he says. “Doesn’t matter.”_

~*~

“Liam. Liam.”

He jolts awake, breathing like a racehorse, sweat running off him in rivulets. Brett’s pushing his hair back gently.

He was dreaming. The realisation settles into him like a fever. He hasn’t seen his mother’s face so clearly in years.

“It was a dream?” He knows it was, but something in him - some scared little kid wanting their mom - makes him ask.

“It was a dream,” Brett’s voice confirms soothingly. “Do you know where you are?”

“Motel,” Liam answers immediately. “With you and Hayden, and that family next door.”

Brett meets someone’s eyes over his head; Liam doesn’t have to look to know Brett’s looking at Hayden. “He’s fine,” Brett says to her quietly. “He’s lucid.”

He hates that they have to check to see if he’s lucid now. Because he isn’t, always. As if it wasn’t bad enough that his mind seems to leave his body when shit gets rough, sometimes when he’s here it’s like he’s not even himself. Like there’s a stranger in his body who has only half his memories.

The sun isn’t up. It takes a moment for him to realise, but it’s still dark - really dark - in their room. It must be before dawn, but just, because Hayden and Brett only look regularly exhausted, not woken-up-by-Liam-screaming exhausted.

He sits. “Time?”

Brett shakes his head. “Dunno. Think we’ve been asleep for a while.”

Liam feels inexplicably uneasy. “We should check on that family,” he murmurs worriedly. “Make sure they’re okay.”

“They’re right across the hall,” Hayden says, in a tone that’s obviously supposed to comfort him. “If anything had happened to them we would know.”

He’s not comforted. He’s on edge. Which, granted, is a very regular state of being for him, but he’s usually not on edge without reason, at least not this much, and-

“One hour,” Brett murmurs to him. “Then we can go look, okay? Just… try to sleep some more, maybe?”

He hates the way they tell him to sleep like it’ll fucking fix everything - the whole zombie apocalypse, everything that’s happened, all his injuries, his mental state.

Well. Brett might be onto something about that last one.

“One hour,” Liam mutters, pulling the sheet back over his body and lying down again. “Then I check and we move.”

~*~

_I’m not crazy._

He’s standing outside, glaring at the sunrise, with his crossbow half-cocked and the weight of a gun heavy against his hip and thigh. Fudge stands at his feet.

_I’m not crazy. At least, not the kind of crazy that thinks someone is following me when there’s no one there. Not that kind of crazy._

“Liam?”

Brett’s standing next to him. Liam can feel him itching to reach out and touch - to try and soothe him - but he doesn’t, seeming to know that Liam’s wound up and ready to explode at any given moment. He feels bad, for worrying them, but…

_I’m not crazy and something is wrong._

“What’s up?” Brett asks.

“Something’s wrong,” Liam snaps uneasily. “And I know that you and Hayden think I’m losing my fucking marbles and you’re probably right, but - not about this, okay?”

Brett nods. “Is someone following us?” he asks softly.

Liam pauses, thinks, but it isn’t that. He doesn’t think they’re being followed - Owen and Vinnie are the only two who really would, and they had no idea where Liam and the others were heading. Unless they’ve picked up some malicious strangers along the way…

“No,” Liam mumbles. “Not… being followed, just… this town. Something isn’t right.”

The heat is rising. Liam had awoken again to find himself sweating, even under the thin sheet used to cover himself last night, his skin prickling with discomfort, the remnants of a nightmare not-quite at the forefront of his mind.

Jensen, Grace, and their kids were still there. Maybe that’s why Liam can’t quite pinpoint what’s wrong. He woke up fully expecting something to have happened, but…

Nothing. Nothing. Just the disconcerting quiet and stillness of the world around them. Maybe it’s the lack of zombies that’s making his brain go haywire. Hell, maybe the wind changed. He wouldn’t be at all shocked if something innocuous caused it.

Brett’s looking him in that sad Brett “Liam’s losing it” way, so he sighs, turns around.

“Come on,” he mutters. “Let’s just go.”

~*~

There isn’t enough room in the RV for all of them, and so the decision is made - somewhere along the line - to pick up another car.

Liam finds one that’s somewhat workable, and they siphon fuel into it from the petrol station. It’s a laborious task, but it gets done eventually. He, Brett and Grace go in the car; Hayden and Jensen and the kids are in the RV.

Miraculously, the feelings of wrongness leave Liam behind as they head further and further away from Pinewood and closer to DC. Maybe it’s just the sitting still. Maybe he can’t do that anymore - put down roots and just stay, without feeling like something or someone is going to catch up to them eventually.

He notices, about halfway into their trip, that Grace is mothering him. Gently, in a subtle manner - but it’s there, nonetheless. Asking if he’s hungry or thirsty. Checking in on his sleep patterns. He finds himself not really minding it; between being abused as a kid and getting separated from his parents when he was fifteen, he hasn’t had much mothering.

It makes him miss his mom. And Tamara - he wonders if they’re doing okay. If they’re alive. He doesn’t think his mom is, but he hopes, and he clings to that hope fiercely. He doesn’t have any evidence she’s dead, after all.

“The RV’s stopping,” Brett says suddenly.

Liam looks up. Sure enough, the RV is stopping, pulling over on the side of the road; Brett follows it. Fudge wriggles in the backseat, whines, and licks Liam’s ear.

Liam’s stomach twists. He doesn’t like this; there aren’t any trees, it’s flat and open, and anyone or anything can see them coming. There are no zombies that he can see, but those bastards have a habit of showing up out of fucking nowhere-

Brett and Grace are exiting the car; Liam follows. There are a few cars around - he supposes this must be the point where people ran out of fuel - but not many.

“What’s going on?” he hears Brett ask.

Liam looks around. Seven cars. All stopped at pretty much the same point, too, which is weird. There’s coincidentally running out of fuel at the same point, and then there’s whatever this is.

Everyone’s talking behind him. He’s not really listening; he’s staring at the cars, stopped, doors flung wide open, empty.

Fudge gives a small yip, trotting over to one of the cars, and leans his front paws up on the driver’s seat. Liam follows, seeing blood splattered on the dashboard.

He looks around again. The doors are open, the windows aren’t smashed in - this wasn’t zombies. When it’s zombies, the doors are closed, windows cracked from the force of a dozen of them trying to break through the glass. And there would be corpses - it’s summer, and the smell would be…

“The tires,” he realises aloud, and kneels on the ground - the front tires are punctured, and when he looks closer, he can see spikes driven into them - the kind of road spikes police would lay down to stop criminals getting away from them.

“Spikes?” he murmurs, staring at the ground. “What…”

Spikes? And the lack of bodies, only some blood, no broken windows - nobody could have walked that far to the next town, not without serious provisions. They would’ve died. The exposure would’ve been enough to get them in the end, and…

“We can’t stay here,” Liam says, standing up and turning around.

There’s no one there. For a moment, he goes cold - fear douses him like a hose, and he breaks into a sweat, and Fudge barks and circles around him anxiously.

“Brett?” he hollers.

The sun beats down on him. The RV’s door is hanging open, and he makes a beeline for it, hearing voices as he gets closer. He can’t tell what’s happening.

“Brett?” he asks, stepping up to the door. “Hayden-?”

“Liam.” It’s Brett; he looks scared. “Stay back, okay? Stay outside.”

“Wha - why? What’s going on?”

“Hannah, she’s sicker than we thought. You have to stay outside, you can’t catch this-”

“We can’t stay here,” Liam argues urgently. “There are road spikes out there - someone put them there, someone’s been stopping all the cars that drive through. We have to go-”

“I believe you,” Brett interrupts. “Liam, I believe you, but right now we need to help Hannah, okay? Can you keep a look out?”

“Brett-” He needs Brett to understand this - that they aren’t safe, that they have to go or something awful could happen - “Okay, but-”

“Okay. Okay, stay out here, okay? Don’t come in here. You haven’t been exposed yet.” With that, Brett’s disappearing, and Liam’s left standing at the door to the RV, feeling helplessly angry and frustrated. He’s been exposed before and he didn’t get sick, so why the hell he’s standing out here staring around he’s got no idea-

“Fine,” he mutters, and stalks off down the road a little bit.

“Liam!”

He turns. Hayden’s following him out of the RV, jogging to catch up to him. Her hair bounces as she does.

“What’s going on?” she asks when she catches up. “It’s only a few minutes-”

“I hate driving,” Liam interrupts. “And look at the ground. There’s spikes.”

Hayden kneels, looking at the front tires of the cars and then underneath them. “These are road spikes,” she says.

“What?”

“Police use these. My sister - she was with the sheriff’s department. Police use these to stop cars in chases. Takes the tires out, can really hurt people if they’re going fast enough.”

“That’s not my only point here,” Liam murmurs. “The cars are empty. No blood, no zombies around. The people in them obviously left, but with the spikes on the road and that the cars have all been looted-”

“Raiders,” Hayden says, a look of realisation dawning across her face. “And they could still be here. If this is a popular spot-”

“It is, it’s a main road. Everyone who’s read a map knows this is the easiest way to cut across this part of the country.” Liam looks around uneasily. “There’s no sign they’re here, but-”

“They’re raiders,” Hayden finishes. “That’s the point.”

“Do you think they’re Keepers? Or with Theo?”

She squints into the distance. “Keepers out this far?” She shakes her head. “Not a chance. The yield is too small for the amount of effort they have to put in. There’s too much risk out here. That’s why they stay in cities. They can control people and zombies. They can’t do anything about the weather.”

Liam looks up. The sun beats down on them mercilessly; he’s suddenly parched, noticing he’s sweating, and hearing Fudge pant next to him. The threat of starvation and darkness in winter seems miles away; now, the sun they’d hoped for for so long is their enemy, and Liam can already feel it - it’s going to be a long journey.

“We can’t stay out here,” he says. “We have to find some sort of shelter. Somewhere we can stop - this isn’t an option.”

“Where?” Hayden asks helplessly. “Everywhere is overrun - zombies, Keepers, it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t seem like there’s a way out.”

Liam looks down the road. If they keep following this, they’ll get to D.C. If they keep following this road, eventually, something will turn up - home, or as close as they can get. If they’re lucky they won’t lose people along the way.

“D.C,” he says. “It’s the only thing left. We get Brett to D.C and we make a cure and we end this.”

“How do we know D.C isn’t overrun?” Hayden asks desperately.

“The rumours had to start somewhere, right?”

“The rumours also said that Oakridge exists,” Hayden points out.

Liam says nothing to that. Oakridge and its significance to Brett are still a sore point to him; in this fictional land, Brett is reunited with everything he had Before and Liam is only a painful, damaged reminder of what came After; he wants to find Oakridge for Brett, and for himself? He never wants to lay eyes on it.

But Brett nearly died, back there in River’s End. Nearly died without finding it. And Liam knows now he’d go to the ends of the earth and beyond just to try and find it for him. If they can hope for something better, there’s something to fight for.

“Something has to,” he says. “We can’t be all that’s left, Hayds.”

“What if we are?”

Liam looks at her for a moment. He’d never considered it; that they might actually be all that’s left. Tiny pockets of humanity, half-heartedly scrounging for Before’s leftovers, meandering their way through an existence that doesn’t make sense to any of them.

“Then we’re gonna have to do better than this,” Liam says shortly.

**Author's Note:**

> Prickly, aggressive Liam is my favourite Liam.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [When Dust Settles](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14277177) by [Cadele](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cadele/pseuds/Cadele)




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